Veins

Day 351: A second foray into my favourite spot yielded up enough Chanterelles for a good fry-up and a large bowl of soup, the amount I usually take when I am foraging. People often tell me that they don't trust themselves to harvest wild mushrooms, and indeed, that caution has its merits. However, there are "beginner" species which are quite delicious, and Chanterelles happen to be among them. So how do you distinguish a Chanterelle from other orange mushrooms, some of which are dangerous? Look at the underside. Where other mushrooms have gills, Chanterelles have raised veins. Sometimes they can look almost like gills, but after a few gathering trips with an experienced mushroomer, you will learn to tell the difference even on narrow-veined young specimens. Or at least most people will. Somehow, my fishing buddy never got the hang of it. When he, his brother-in-law and I used to go 'shrooming, we'd have to check his basket closely, and nine times out of ten, we'd be forced to make him throw away his collection because of some toxic gilled species he'd added in. He was the poster child for the phrase, "All mushrooms are edible...once."