It seems to be a good season for mushrooms and toadstools. Not only are they prolific this year, in numbers and variety, but they also seem to be larger than usual, and yesterday morning I may have found an explanation. We met a couple foraging for food from the grassy embankments and hedgerows, who explained this was an exceptional year for fungi because the unusually warm weather has meant that the summer and autumn seasons have overlapped, and so here we are at the beginning of November with summer fungal fruiting bodies pushing up through autumn leaves alongside the mushrooms normally found at this time of the year. This couple had collected three varieties of mushrooms, together with wild pears, in an ancient wicker basket, and were now heading for Croft Hill to see what varieties were thriving amongst the fresh cow-pats. That’s not actually what they said, but as a regular walker on the Hill, I knew that is what they would find.
I did try fried puff ball last year – it must be firm and fresh, and puff balls only stay firm and fresh for an hour so after dawn. The texture was fine but the flavour was lacking, even when fried in bacon fat. The foraging pair advised me that puff balls are best prepared as soup, with plenty of seasoning. And so I had not only walked the dogs, I had received an interesting lecture on natural foods, and also had a cookery lesson. Excellent value.
On the subject of natural foods, we have a pound or two of sloes in the freezer, and yesterday @shepherdmanswife bought a bottle of cheap-and-cheerful gin. It’s time to make the seasonal sloe gin, ready for Christmas.
Okay, I'm trying to imagine eating puff balls cooked any way. Please I hope yours are different from ours because the ones I am thinking of have a shell like old paper. Okay need some coffee to get that taste out of my mind.
@joansmor You have to get up early, or the shell turns from skin like a mushroom and goes, to all papery, and the inside goes mushy! Puff balls are definately a breakfast, not dinner, option !
Nice edible mushroom, but I never tasted one. There are a lot of berries in European Rowans now and I made rowan jam for the first time. It is delicious.
