Finally, we found ourselves some chanterelle mushrooms!

I am thrilled to report the success we had this afternoon, trekking through the woods, the ferns and the deep, soft humus. If the saying “three times a charm” means anything, then I suppose today it came through. A month ago we looked and found no chanterelles, but a gorgeous chicken of the woods. The second time we ventured – no chanterelles – but we did find some lobster mushrooms. Today, after a little more internet research, I found us the perfect place to find Cantharellus cibarius. Between the two of us we found roughly 5 pounds of mushrooms. And like a ‘good’ mushroom forager, I cannot share the “secret spot.”

When I wrote the menu for this week’s meals I wanted to eat 100% NW cuisine. Today’s successful foraging will help along with this goal. Though I must admit, tonight we deviated from the plan. Because we found so many mushrooms and were too tired to prepare any sort of massive feast, we used some leftover ingredients in the kitchen to make ourselves a spontaneous meal of our own devising.

We began with the iron skillet – placed over a medium-high heat with a whopping 3 tablespoons of butter. Once that had melted and the bubbles fizzled out a bit, we threw in about 2 tablespoons of sliced shallots.

Shallots and butter are two main ingredients to a good cream sauce.

The shallots cooked for 2-3 minutes. I knew that they should not cook till browned as that would suggest too high a heat. Instead we cooked them till soft and then threw in 1 pound of chopped up mushrooms.

The chanterelles were cut into 1 inch slices.

It is important to note that chanterelles are not cultivated in a structured environment, i.e. you can’t grow them in the garden; you have to find them in the woods. That said, chanterelles are dirty mushrooms. They are covered in pine needles, dirt and maybe insects of varying type. If you purchase this type of mushroom and it’s looking rather spotless, you may want to find out how that was done. Even grocery store chanterelles should have a little dirt on them. We like to see this earthly matter as proof of wild food. Unlike portabellos or crimini mushrooms that sometimes look like they are grown in uniform conditions, these beauties come in all shapes and sizes. Though as you may notice, older chanterelles have a trumpet shape. I also learned today that a great way to identify real chanterelles vs. false ones is smell. A real one smells like apricots!

Notice the different ways the mushroom's top curls.

Another important characteristic of the chanterelle is the gill structure, aka the lamellae. Underneath the curling top lies a series of blunt ridges that look like gills. Unlike other mushrooms, on a chanterelle these ridges stretch from the top to the stem. As far as I understand, these “gills,” the common golden color (though they do appear in other shades), and the trumpet-like lid are common characteristics for most folks to identify the exact mushroom. For those mushrooms we picked that did not perfectly fit our identification needs, they were tossed out with the collected insects and stray pieces of dirt.

Anyways, back to the cooking!

So, the chopped mushrooms were added to the butter and shallots and cooked for 5-7 minutes. We wanted chanterelles soft and chewable for our salivating palates. After enough minutes passed, we poured about 3/4 cup of cream into the pan. Salt and pepper was also added. The mushrooms and sauce cooked for a couple more minutes. All the while, the pasta was drained and some parsley was minced.

Chanterelles, cream, shallots, butter, salt and pepper.

I suppose this meal is one of the more classic means of preparing wild mushrooms.  If you look online for recipes, you will often see butter and cream with wild mushrooms. Looking at our menu for the week, I think this is a good meal to continue our regional cuisine experience. (Last night we had some locally sourced lamb chops with fresh vegetables.)

The final dish was composed of pasta, piled in the middle of a bowl, covered with the chanterelles and cream sauce, some minced parsley and a little bit of finely grated parmesan cheese. Damn, do we eat like royalty!

Viola!

Related posts:

1. Foraging (part 1)
2. The Dark Side of the Organic Food Movement
3. Cuisines of the World potluck – Vietnam
4. Children of the Asphalt
5. Home Cooking

Tags: cooking, foraging, NW cuisine, Recipes, wild mushrooms