Lycoperdon Perlatum, Puffballs

Day 360: It's been a long time since I found enough puffballs (Lycoperdon perlatum) for a bowl of soup, and that status remains unchanged. However, I did find a nice little cluster, all but one of which are shown in the photo above, and I was sorely tempted to gather them to add to the few chanterelles I had in my bag but did not. With puffballs, timing is everything and usually when I find them, they are too far gone to collect. Once the interior begins to turn brown (even faintly), they take on a bitter taste. There are a number of different edible puffballs, but Lycoperdon perlatum is the most common here in the Pacific Northwest. You can find them almost anywhere: deep in the forest, in your lawn, even poking up through hard-packed gravel along road edges or in your driveway. Lycoperdon perlatum is relatively easy to identify by the small warts on its surface, but with any puffball, it is always advisable to section one vertically and examine it for any evidence of gill formation. If it is marshmallow-like throughout, it's not an Amanita. That said, Lycoperdon is bothersome to prepare. Each puffball must be peeled like a hard-boiled egg, a process which often means sacrificing some of the flesh. A handful as small as this one might have yielded a whole tablespoon, so I left them to make more puffballs and made a mental note of the location for future reference.

No Old, Bold Mushroomers

Day 5: It's often said that there are old pilots and bold pilots, but no old, bold pilots. The same is true of mushroomers. While no experienced mushroom hunter would confuse these two fungi, an over-enthusiastic beginner might easily do so with unpleasant, even tragic results. That's a puffball on the left, good eating if picked before the interior starts to turn brown. On the right is a young Amanita muscaria, your classic "toadstool," dangerously poisonous.

There are a number of edible and choice "beginner" mushrooms, but even those may sometimes prove challenging to novice collectors. I used to go out chanterelle-picking with my fishing buddy and his brother-in-law. The brother-in-law knew his stuff, and often came home with his basket full of things I didn't feel I could confidently identify. On the other hand, although he and I had showed the third member of our team the chanterelle's characteristic veins (as opposed to gills), we invariably had to sort through his gleanings to remove Galerina autumnalis (poisonous) and anything else which just happened to be orange. Sometimes, we just discarded the whole lot out of concern for cross-contamination.

While there is no scientific difference between a "mushroom" and a "toadstool" (it's only semantic), knowing whether a species is edible, poisonous or just not worth the bother is a crucial distinction when harvesting mushrooms from the wild. Be "105%" sure when you pick. You might not get a chance to say, "Well, I guess I was wrong about that one."

Puffball Perfection

Day 10: As unlikely as it might seem, many Puffballs are edible and some species are considered choice, but they must be picked when young, and care must be taken when cleaning them to ensure that the collector hasn't gathered any young Amanitas by mistake. Each puffball must be sliced in two vertically to ensure that the interior contains no evidence of gill formation or a stem. Puffball flesh should be white throughout, and if any tinge of brown is apparent, the mushroom should be discarded. The exterior of Lycoperdon perlatum is similar to the shell of an egg; peel your puffballs before cooking. Sliced and sauteed in butter or cooked in gravy, they make an excellent topping for meats.