HA-14

Boletes: Friendly Fungi
for the Foraging Herbalist

By Cliff Seruntine

In a world where the vast majority of people have forgotten that all domestic foods were bred from original wild stock, folk tend to lose sight of the fact that things like lettuce started their existence as plants very closely related to the common dandelion, and potatoes as well as tomatoes began their existence as plants closely related to nightshade.

Having forgotten such things, many people view wild foraging with suspicion. My wife and I live on a sprawling homestead deep in the Canadian North Woods, and usually when I forage wild foods I am off someplace remote, but sometimes, like if I happen to be on a supply run to one of the villages, I might espy something in a park or hedge and snag it. Harvesting wild foods where others can see never fails to garner strange and curious looks of alarm.

Once while in the village, I came across a thicket of wild cherries in a little park beside a river. I pulled over to gather them, and as I was sweeping the little fruit from the branch into a cloth bag I always keep with me, a passerby paused to observe what I was doing. Her face slowly screwed into an image of horror as she realized I meant to eat them later.

“Don’t you know those are poisonous?” she said.

I replied, “No, they’re just wild cherries.” I explained that wild cherries are bitter raw, but when simmered to a pulp and cut with a little tart juice, they made excellent jelly or syrup.

But she held fast to her position. “No! My mother told me they are poison!”

“I’m sorry, but your mother was wrong,” I told her. Of course, people rarely ever take being told their mother is wrong very well. The woman studied me as if I were some kind of bug, then turned on her heal and stormed away. But I simply wasn’t going to dump my bagful of lovely wild cherries because of her mother’s misconceptions.

And if you think harvesting wild plants gets odd looks, if I happen to snag some wild mushrooms growing in one of those little parks, some people have conniptions. Another time in the village I saw some dryad saddles growing on a massive, fallen poplar—enough mushrooms to fill most of my cloth grocery sack. I was sawing away at the third or fourth mushroom stem with my folding knife when a jogger approached.

Without any preamble, he declared, “Dear god! You’ll die if you eat that!”

I replied, “Oh, no, it’s just a dryad saddle.”

“It’s tree mold! If it kills trees it’ll kill you, too!”

I shrugged and dropped the fungus into my bag. “Well, when you think about it, all fungi are mold; even the agaricus bisporus they sell at the grocery…”

“What the grocer sells is a mushroom. That’s totally different!” he interrupted.

“This fungus grows on dead wood,” I said. “The store mushroom grows on chicken manure. I’d rather eat this one.”

“You have a lot to learn, buddy!” he declared and then jogged away.

I did learn a lot that day. I learned that dryad saddles sliced thin and sauteed in garlic venison gravy are awesome. But the simple fact is that in a world where most of the old, traditional skills of living by the land have been forgotten; contemporary people fear foraging wild foods. In particular, mushrooms really terrify a lot of people. I have a friend who is retired British military and runs a bushcraft school. He’s a pretty tough, courageous guy, but he simply won’t touch wild mushrooms.

“It’s too hard to tell which is which,” he declared once to me.

Yet, it really is no harder than learning to tell one plant from another. Just like fruit and herbs, you have to know what to look for. In this article I’m going to introduce you to a class of my favorite edible mushroom, the bolete, and its close cousin, the leccinum. I have chosen this type of mushroom because it is easily distinguished from other mushrooms, and while some members of the class are poisonous, none are deadly. If you eat a bad bolete or leccinum, you’re in for a couple days of stomach cramps and flulike symptoms, but unless you have an unusual allergy, that’s about it.

Gilled versus Non-Gilled Mushrooms

Mushrooms come in all shapes and sizes. For example, witch’s butter is a rubbery fungi that feeds on dead trees. It is a pretty, yellow blob of no particular shape. But for our purposes, we are only going to deal with the mushrooms that people tend to think of as classically shaped, which is to say they have stems and caps.

There are many species of mushrooms that follow this general pattern, and they are divided into gilled and non-gilled types. Gilled mushrooms include amanitas, russulas, agaricus, and others. The mushroom commonly sold on grocery store shelves—agaricus bisporus—is an example of a gilled mushroom. If you turn it over and look under the cap, you will see paper-thin sheets running from the stem to the cap. Any student of mushrooming learns quickly that most of the seriously toxic mushrooms are found among the gilled fungi. Some are absolutely lethal, like the destroying angel, of the Amanita family. Identifying good from bad gilled mushrooms can be tricky, even for an expert. I’ve been harvesting wild mushrooms for a long time, but I don’t consider gilled mushrooms worth the risk. So for my part, I avoid all of them except the honey mushroom, shaggymane, and the oyster mushroom, which I know well.

There are also many varieties of non-gilled mushrooms, including morels, chanterelles, and our subject of interest, boletes. We are going to focus on boletes because this class has many delicious edibles, and while some are poisonous, they are easily distinguished, and none are deadly.

The bolete has a classic form, which is to say it has a stem and cap. However, if you flip over the cap you will clearly see it does not have gills. Rather, the underside (with a few exceptions; there are always exceptions in the mushroom world) appears to be a dense sponge. The spongy side is actually a mass of spore tubes. In some boletes, they are closely packed and the individual tubes are virtually indistinguishable unless you study them through a loupe. Among other boletes, the spore tubes are large enough that they can be distinguished with the naked eye.

Boletes all share the following characteristics:

• Under the cap they are spongy. They never have gills. (If in doubt, throw it out!)

• They have a central stem, which is to say the stem joins the cap at the center.

• The spongy area is a tube layer that can (if desired) be peeled away without too much trouble.

• They have soft but firm flesh.

• They grow from the ground, never out of wood, or dung, or other growing medium.

• They almost always grow within a few yards of trees.

Some boletes have straight stems like other mushrooms, but the stems always join the cap at the center. The stems may feel smooth or reticulated (as if a fine webbing has been laid over them). The caps may feel dry (especially after a rain) or a bit sticky, as if they have been glazed with honey. If the cap feels slimy it’s a member of the bolete family called suilus, which are not covered in this article, so avoid it for now.

Some boletes have rough or fuzzy stems. These are leccinums. Their stems are covered with a feature called scabers: small protrusions like tiny, soft scales. For identification and cooking, treat leccinums as boletes with one exception (covered below).

Edible versus Inedible Boletes

Most boletes are edible, but a few are poisonous. None are known to be deadly, though there have been a few cases in which people had very strong reactions to the poisonous ones and died. It is astronomically rare that anyone dies from eating a poisonous bolete, though. I tend to think of a death as more like an allergic reaction—more an issue of the mushroomer’s constitution. However, toxic boletes are easily identified, making this class of mushrooms one of the safest for the forager.

When harvesting boletes, simply test for the blues. Avoid anything that bruises or cuts blue. Some mushroom guides say you only need to avoid boletes with orange, red, or bright yellow undersides that bruise or cut blue. But mushroomers have a saying: “There are old mushroomers and there are bold mushroomers, but there are no old, bold mushroomers.” They also say every mushroomer will eventually eat a mildly poisonous mushroom and suffer cramps. I have never gotten sick from mushrooms because I am exceedingly cautious with them. It’s up to you, but I recommend you simply avoid any bolete that bruises or cuts blue.

To test for the blues, pinch a corner when you harvest a bolete. If it turns blue in a few seconds, discard it. If it doesn’t, bag it and check again at home. When you get home with your harvest, see if the bruise has turned blue. If not, do a cut test. This will expose the bolete’s flesh to air, which may cause a color change. Slice the cap and stem in half and set them aside. Pinch one corner of a half and wait four hours. If any blue appears, discard it. If not, it’s a keeper.

Regarding leccinums, check for the blues but also discard any leccinums with orange caps (upper or underside). Now, only one or two species of orange capped leccinums are poisonous, and that refers to the upper side, but better to err on the side of caution.

If you make a mistake, you’ll experience something like a stomach flu for a day or two. Drink fluids and consult a doctor, but it’ll pass. However, it’s so easy to sort good from bad boletes and leccinums that you should never have a problem.

Harvesting Boletes

Harvesting boletes is easy. When you spot one just pluck it by the base of the stem from the ground. While in the field carry them in a cloth bag or some kind of airy basket—never keep them in plastic. Mushrooms will begin to spoil almost immediately if kept in plastic.

Boletes do have one big problem: bugs and worms love them! From a bug’s perspective it’s a giant, tasty packet of nutritious protein. It’s tragic, really. Boletes can become huge, and I’ve harvested a few with caps some nine inches across weighing nearly two pounds. But it’s rare to find usable ones so big because, usually by that time, the bugs are well into them.

So, when you harvest, check the bolete for insect damage. If it’s heavily infested, leave it. If it’s only lightly damaged and passes the blues test, take it home, slice it thin, and remove the odd worm or bug that may be tunnelling through the mushroom’s flesh. The bugs don’t spoil the mushroom, and once they are gone, you can still use it. If you are fast to the woods after a rain, though, you can often find young- to middle-age boletes free (or nearly so) of insect or worm damage.

Preserving and Preparing Boletes

Boletes are delicious fresh, but their flavor actually improves if they are dried and stored a while. To dry them, simply slice them thin (no thicker than one-fifth of an inch) and dry them outdoors if the air is cooperative. If not, lay them out on a dehydrator. Dry until they are as firm as potato chips. Once dry, I lightly salt them to help them keep, then store them in a jar.

When you are ready to use them, just throw them directly in your pasta sauce or stew. If you want to fry them, rehydrate them in a bowl of water, just barely covering them, until they are again rubbery. Very few wild mushrooms can be digested raw by the human body, so note that you should always cook wild mushrooms before eating.