Fungal Jungal - Early Winter 1998

Important Notices!!
The Western Montana Mycological Association (WMMA) is changing! A Montana nonprofit corporation since April 1998, the WMMA is applying for federal nonprofit status. This will allow us to further our goals as expressed in the Mission Statement "to further educate people about fungi, edible and otherwise, and to encourage responsible mushroom harvest and preserve mushroom habitat."

Because of a financially successful symposium, our existing account, and a donation precipitated by the new nonprofit status, we now have $2,048.47 in the WMMA account.

As announced at the September Symposium, nominations have been accepted for positions on the Board of Directors. The following people have accepted nomination and now it is up to you, the members, to VOTE!

Director/Treasurer: Larry Evans
Secretary: Todd Osmundson, Rattlesnake, Egan Jankowski-Bradley
Deputy Director: Dale Johnson, Drake Barton, Rodd Galloway, Keith Leatherman

The WMMA officers (president, vice-president, secretary, treasurer) will be appointed from the list of nominees by the board of directors after the board is elected by the membership at large. You will notice that we seem to have a gender imbalance among those who have nominated themselves, so I urge more members, especially of the female persuasion, to consider serving!

The ballot is CONVIENTLY combined with your MEMBERSHIP RENEWAL form on the last page (ballot is not available online)! What service! And while I am flattered that nobody wants to run against me for Director, I do kinda wonder if that just means that the job is too much work...

The Fungal Jungal is going online, thanks to the dedicated efforts of Brian Sherry of the Outdoor Bookstore in Libby, MT. You can visit our site at http://www.wildrockies.org/fungal-jungal

On the educational front, it has been recommended that the WMMA use some of its funds to create a half-hour or hour long video about mushrooming in Montana. Another idea is to produce an educational "mushroom trunk" in cooperation with the Natural History Center, which would be available for school teachers around the state to borrow free of charge. The trunk would contain slides, dry mushrooms, and other material and would allow teachers to present a mushroom curriculum without extensive research and preparation. Trunks such as these for wolves, birds, plants, etc. have been very successful.

Your comments, inputs, and suggestions are welcome, as well as recommendations about what individuals or organizations might be able to help with these projects. There is a space for this on your ballot! VOTE!

Notes:
An addendum to the observations on animal urine as a factor in fungus fruitings: A gentleman who attended one the workshops this summer in the Kootenai NF reported that he and his hunting buddies regularly camped in the same campsite and urinated in a particular spot, so they would not inadventently walk through it. During the rainy fall last year, he observed an unusually heavy fruiting of more than one species of fungi in this same spot.

Three Taste Tests

- Flathead Lake Taste Test -
Six mellow mushroom munchers marveled at the five fine fungi fried on this awful hot August afternoon. Russula occidentalis, the green-cap Russula, made an unusual but welcome addition to the species sampled; it was chosen as the tastiest by most samplers, with a score of 9.

Second was the yellow staining woodland Agaricus sylivcola, one of my personal favorites, with 13 points.

Third and fourth place, respectively, went to Hydnum repandum, (some surprisingly early yellow units) with 16 points, and Albatrellus ovinus, the sheeps head polypore, with 17.

The Albatrellus has become a regular presence at summertime taste tests, and I've learned a few things about it as a result. Many people LOVE the lemony taste of the raw mushroom, and marvel at the flavor of the fried units as well, which is less "brown" than the flavor of Agaricus, and has a bit more earthy savor than the shimeji, which it resembles in flavor somewhat. But repeated ingestion of this mushroom produces a strange change in peoples' perceptions. The second time one tries this fungus in a week, the flavor loses some of its appeal. Try it a third time in as many days, and a definite bitter edge is detected that wasn't noticeable at first. And if you continue to eat it on a daily basis, your opinion of this mushroom will drop to the point that you would really rather not eat it at all. Perhaps this signals the buildup of an unpleasant compound, or perhaps its flavor appeal is in its uniqueness. At any rate, since it is a common fungus in our upper elevations, I urge people to partake of this fungus cautiously, no matter how much you enjoy the flavor at first.

A surprise last place was Lycoperdon perlatum, a fungus much enjoyed and the favorite of many a mycophagist. I suspect the fact that these specimens had suffered a couple days of infrequent refrigeration contributed to their low standing here.

- Black Dog Taste Test -
Half a dozen dedicated diners delved into a tray of five fungi after the Farmer's Market. All fungi scored very closely, and opinions varied widely, making my "rating" system meaningless.

Rating highly with most tasters was Lactarius rubrilactea, the "delicious Lactarius", and almost equal was the Gypsy muchroom, Rozites caperata.

A slightly less enthusiastic review was given to Cantharellus formosa, aka C. cibarius, the northern Rockies version of the golden chanterelle. Some were surprised that they liked an "unknown" mushroom better than this cherished commercial species.

Least favored by those present were Albatrellus ovinus and Russula occidentalis. The latter was slightly undercooked.

- An Italian Tasting -
After an unusually productive day of hunting in the Calabria region of southern Italy, Kris and I sampled a very large number of fungi before combining the best of them into a mushroom duxelle. Here are our impressions; the species are listed from favorite to least impressed.

Boletus edulis. The King! Best chestnutty/ floral flavor of the boletes
Lepiota procera, excellent and strong: nutty and smokey
Clitopilus prunulus, a first for both of us, under oaks; a cross between plums and mushrooms, with a nice texture. Much nicer than a similar US species I'd found to be bitter and humus-tasting under conifers in moss.
Coprinus comatus. Indistinguishable from our local type. Delicious.
Leccinum (boletus) rufescens a local variant of our L. insigne, with a nice mild smoky falvor. It blackend upon cooking; we only ate the stem.
Lactarius deliciosus, again, a local variant; very zonate cap and a more scrobiculate stipe, very little "greening" of the flesh. Well cooked, it was tasty and had a good texture. Certainly not better than our local type.
Clitocybe nebularis, a huge and commonly eaten mushroom here, despite the unappealing aroma of older units. A smoky sour flavor easily tired of.
Tricholoma imbricatum, collected from under beech by the local commercial gatherers, it looks like our T. Pessundatum (inedible) or T. Populinum (edible). A very strong, dark taste we compared to burnt wine.
Suillus (xerocomus) luteus, this white-fleshed suillus with a dark cap was preferred over the other Suillus by the local folk; the flesh is firmer, and holds up better under cooking, but texture a problem. Good flavor.
Sullius (xerocomus) granulatus. Much like our local S.G. Yellow flesh, soggy after cooking and a mild oystery-lemon taste. Merely acceptable.
Hypholoma sublateritium. A relative of the delightful H Capnoides, this orange-red capped species was abundant. Despite its reputation as inedible, the taste of the raw mushroom was mild and we tasted it. It was bitter and very dark-woodsy tasting, and did not go into the duxelle.

In the duxelle, we found that mixing the Boletus was a terrible waste, as it was lost in the lesser fungi. Mixing Lepiota procera with a much larger volume of Coprinus comatus worked VERY WELL and was better than either species alone! Clitopilus prunulus likewise improved Clitocybe nebularis, making the latter much more palatable.

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