Mushrooms and foraging

"There are two spiritual dangers in not owning a farm. One is the danger of supposing that breakfast comes from the grocery, and the other that heat comes from a furnace. To avoid the first danger, one should plant a garden, preferably where there is no grocer to confuse the issue." Aldo Leopold, Sand County Almanac

Part of this year has been spent getting to know the hidden treasures found on the farm, mushrooms.  We experienced the thrill of foraging mushrooms and learning not only the delectable edible ones but how to forage these unique gifts from nature.  In years past we always discussed how we should learn to forage mushrooms as we could see them all over the property! Despite the abundance of mushrooms we, or more appropriately me, were apprehensive of picking and eating mushrooms we did not know.  To aid us in gaining knowledge of the mycological edibles, we first enlisted a good chef friend of ours, who foraged mushrooms on a regular basis for his restaurant in Madison, Osteria Papavero.  Chef Francesco Mangano became our guide into the woods and assisting in learning the mushrooms varieties found on the farm. He was careful to point out the ones he knew about and quick to point out the ones he did not know.  Along with Francesco, we purchased two books the “The National Audubon Society Field Guide to Mushrooms” and “Mushroom with Confidence” by Alexander Schwab. The first book proved to be the most useful as it not only offered visuals for comparison with the mushrooms it also contained important information about the mushrooms. Francesco also suggested we join the Upper Midwest USA Mushroom IdentificationGroup on Facebook.  This proved to be invaluable!  We would take pictures of the mushrooms in the environment where we located the mushrooms, and take pictures of the mushrooms on the top and underneath; post the pictures on their Facebook page and within a short period of time we would get an identification response!  

Chick of the Woods 

Aborted Entoloma

The satisfying results of foraging are not just about finding the mushrooms and having the opportunity to cook these delectable treats.  Walking the land and looking around you and exploring the many different contours of the land and catching the glimpse of the wildlife found on the farm can be exhilarating in itself.  When you are foraging you have to look up, down and underneath and around trees, bushes and logs, sometimes you may even brush away leaves to find the growing population of mushrooms.  In one incident, we walked into the woods around dusk and as we made our approach into the woods you could hear turkeys roosting in the trees suddenly deciding they did not like being near us and take flight to the next tree.  We are not talking about 1 or 2 turkeys, no more like 10 or more! Another time we were walking and Sara came across a red coral looking mushroom, it was located in amongst a pile of leaves; it truly was a thing of beauty! I took a picture of the mushroom in its environment and made sure to get all angles of the growth including where we located the mushroom. I posted it on the Facebook page and within a short time we learned it was a Chick of the Woods or Laetiporus sulphureus.  Later I cooked this wonderful mushroom with roast beets, roast pears, roast parsnips and onion cream.  Sara immediately discovered why its name, Chick of the Woods, was indeed because it had the texture of chicken! The flavor was like no other mushroom I have eaten, truly earthy but in such a nice way. 

On another occasion, I had gone down to our summer campsite to take care of our tent and as I walked over to our tent I was looking down and all around me were mushrooms! They had popped up over the last few days and I immediately recognized them as Aborted Entoloma! The work on the tent was put off as I started gathering as many as I could and get them into a bag for dinner the next night! To be sure I posted the pictures of where I found them on the Facebook page and reviewed the field guide.  I was correct in my findings they indeed were the aborted entolomas! For these, I washed them off and sliced them to be sautéed with potato gnocchi.  The flavor was not the same as the chick of the woods but still tasty. They were much milder than the chick of the woods and the next time I prepare them I will look at both drying them first and grating them after they are dry.  I have done this with other mushrooms in the past and find that the dried mushroom ends up having a much more pronounced flavor.

Roast root vegetables, pears and chick of the woods mushrooms

Potato gnocchi and Entoloma mushrooms

Our garden fared well this year and we were able to harvest beets, carrots, leeks, parsnips, and mustard!  I cut back on growing vegetables in all six beds this year as we did not think we would need as much from the garden. This did two things, first I planted a cover crop, mustard and mustard is a great green manure; when it reaches a certain height you cut it down, cover it and it will decompose into the soil thus creating a great source of nitrogen and the second great beneficiary is eating the mustard because you end up with a great deal of it even when you cover the crop! From late July thru the harvest time we were eating leeks, carrots and beets as I worked on thinning out the crops.  All in all, I believe we ended up with at least 50 pounds of carrots, 25 pounds of beets and 10 pounds of parsnips. The leeks fared well and we ended up with about 3 dozen leeks.  Around mid-August, I planted more leeks and my plan will be to harvest them in the spring.  I heavily mulched the bed and in fact covered the young leeks.  We will see if they make it through the winter.  I also planted garlic this fall in one of the beds we did not grow vegetables; garlic is something I use a lot in my cooking and so I felt it was time to have some garlic. I talked with another farmer friend of mine from Garden to Be Scott Williams about obtaining the garlic for planting and he had a source! Thanks to Scott I was able to get the garlic and we discussed planting the garlic and any tips he might have to assist me in my planting. The plan with garlic is to snip the garlic scapes when they come up in the spring (they are tasty by themselves) and this will allow the plant to focus its energy on producing the garlic bulb. These are generally harvested in late June.  I am anxious to see the outcome of both the garlic bed and the leek bed.

The harvest from the garden

Leek bed ready to go through the winter

Recipes:

Roast beets, parsnips, pears, onion cream and chick of the woods

Yield: serves 4

Ingredients

4 medium sized beets

4 medium sized parsnips

4 pears

1 leek

1 whole unpeeled white onion

Chick of the woods mushrooms

2 tablespoons of sunflower oil

½ cup of Olive oil

¼ cup of Lemon juice

To taste Salt and pepper

1 tablespoon of brown sugar

½ cup of honey

¼ cup of white wine vinegar

Method:

1.       Wash the root vegetables thoroughly and dry them off. Place them in a heavy pan with a couple of tablespoons of olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Roast them in the oven at 375 degrees until they are tender.  The parsnips may finish cooking before the beets; just remove them while continuing to cook the beets. Remove from the oven and set aside to cool enough to handle them. Using paper towel or towel that you don’t mind turning bright red, rub off the peeling from the roast beet. Slice the root end off of the beets and the top end off; quarter the beet for serving. Cut the parsnips into smaller pieces.  Set aside to combine with other ingredients in an area where you can keep them warm.

2.       Cut the tops off of the pears and cut the bottoms off the pears. Place in a pan with a tablespoon of olive oil and sprinkle brown sugar on each pear. Roast at the same time you are roasting the beets and other root vegetables. When they are tender cut wedges off the pears and remove the core. Slice the wedges into ½ inch wedges and keep warm.

3.       Place the whole onion in a heavy-bottomed pan, skin and all, into the oven with a tablespoon of olive oil. Roast until tender. When tender remove the onion from the oven and simply squeeze out the inner part of the onion from the skin. Cut the bottom off of the onion and puree it in a blender with the remaining olive oil and lemon juice. Season with salt and pepper.

4.       Slice and wash the chick of the woods mushrooms and look for any tiny twigs, leaves etc. that the mushroom may have grown around.  Dry the mushrooms and in a sauté pan add the sunflower oil and heat the oil to just before smoking.  Slice and wash the leeks while the oil is heating up and add to the hot oil along with the sliced mushrooms.  Cook the mushrooms over medium heat until they start to get crispy and most of the water has evaporated from the mushroom.

5.       Combine the roasted root vegetables with the pears and add the honey and vinegar and mix together.

6.       Place all of the ingredients into a bowl and drizzle some of the onion cream around the bowl and serve.

Gnocchi sauteing in clarified butter

Entoloma and Potato Gnocchi

Yield: 20 dozen small gnocchi

Ingredients

2 pounds russet potatoes

1 ¼ cup all-purpose flour

3 large egg yolks

2 tablespoons kosher salt
1/4 cup of clarified butter

Sauce

½ pound of diced tomato

¼ cup of olive oil

1 tablespoon of chop garlic

1 tablespoon of chop shallots

¼ cup balsamic vinegar

1 tablespoon of minced chives

Salt and pepper to taste

Entolomas

¼ pound of Entoloma mushrooms

3 tablespoons of sunflower oil

1 tablespoon chopped shallots

½ tablespoon chopped garlic

1 tablespoon chopped parsley

½ cup dry white wine

Method:

1. In an oven preheated to 350 degrees bake the potatoes for one hour or until they are tender.  Scoop out the potatoes into a ricer and place on a board or counter.  Make a well in the center. Place a layer of about a ½ cup of flour in the well, add the egg yolks, and then add about ½ cup more flour and the salt. Use a dough scraper to chop the potatoes into the flour and eggs. Do this quickly to prevent the dough from being overworked.  Add more flour as necessary. The resulting dough should be homogeneous and barely sticky on the outside. Shape the dough into a ball. Roll the ball of dough lightly in flour. 
2. Pull off a section of dough and roll into a long tube that is about a ½ inch thick. Cut into ½ inch pieces. Take gnocchi one at a time and using a lightly floured gnocchi paddle push the gnocchi onto the paddle and roll it down the paddle onto a floured surface.  It is best to test the first gnocchi off the paddle for seasoning and durability. Bring a pot of heavily salted water to a boil and when you have the first gnocchi completed drop into the boiling salted water. The gnocchi is finished when it floats to the top. Test the flavor and if it has not exploded in the water it is good to go. Once the all of the gnocchi have been blanched in the salted water remove them to toweling and lay them out to cool completely. Do not stack the gnocchi when you remove them from the water or you will smash them!  You can freeze them at this stage or use immediately.
3. In a medium size sauce pot add the olive oil, chop garlic, and chop shallots and heat together for a few seconds. Add the diced tomato and cook together covered until all of the tomatoes have broken down into a liquid. Add the balsamic vinegar and remove the cover and cook to a sauce consistency. Finish with salt and pepper and minced chives.
4. Wash the entolomas and slice them. Sauté the sliced mushrooms in about 2 tablespoons of sunflower oil with the garlic and shallots. They should be somewhat crispy when you are finished sautéing them.  When they have reached a nice brown color add the white wine and set aside.
5. In another sauté pan add clarified butter and let it heat up over medium heat. Add the blanched gnocchi and sauté in the butter until they are lightly browned. Remove the gnocchi from the pan and add the mushrooms.  Toss the finished gnocchi with the sauce and sprinkle grated Parmesan cheese over the top with a little extra virgin olive oil and serve.