Jaketastic

Yesterday my brother and I spent the sunny, fall day hiking to Ramona falls. We passed several serious looking foragers bearing pointed sticks and oversized backpacks, alerting us to the presence of an esteemed macrofungus.  Among the plethora of mushrooms fruiting along the trail, I was eventually able to find several large and new Tricholoma Magnivelare. The distinctive piney odor of the species seemed to me much fainter than the descriptions I read indicated. The slightness of the scent, the white, domed cap and white gills would have made me more sceptical, but I’d recently gathered and identified it’s dangerous look-alike: Aminita Smithiana in the hills near the north fork reservoir of the Clackamas on the 18th.

This is how some of them ended up:

The texture of the mushrooms improved and lent a subtle taste to the broth. I used canned stock, a splash of white wine and a hunk of pork fat, I imagine it would be much better with homemade beef or chicken stock. The matsutake flavor and aroma is becoming more and more robust with my repeated exposures to it. I had not tasted or smelled matsutakes until I collected these on Wednesday. Maybe my brain had to make the necessary connections to fully experience this mushroom.

hiking, matsutake, mushrooms, oregon

I managed to drag myself onto the bus and rode to the Oregon Mycological Society meeting last night. I had never been to Washington Park MAX Station and for a guy who’s only ever had one experience on a subway it’s kind of neat. I was alone at the station. The wailing echoes of the light rail train and the steady rush of cold underground air it pushes emanate long before and after the trains arrive. Pressting the “S” button on the elevator took me over 500 feet up in just a few seconds, depositing me in the mostly deserted zoo parking lot.

My brother has just pointed out that there is only one real way to arrive at this train station in style:

http://jaketastic.com/blog/vid/max2.swf

Anyway, Gary Slone of the Audobon Society gave a little talk covering mushroom basics. Fortunately he let slip a few tidbits here and there for those of us who’ve met a mushroom before. It looks like Sauvie island is a good place to look for Verpa Bohemica, which Gary claims are edible and good in moderation if cooked thoroughly.

mushrooms, oregon mycological society