copyright � Dr. Gerald Barad 2009
Tuesday, 6 October 2009
A Flock of Mushrooms
copyright � Dr. Gerald Barad 2009
Don't I look happy! And here is why.
Jerry called yesterday. He was sitting at the computer, gazing out the window and saw something whitish at the base of an oak tree in the driveway turn-around. "It was hen of the woods!" he said. Grifola frondosa is a different mushroom from chicken of the woods, Laetiporus sulphureus, which is a tasty bracket mushroom.
Chicken of the woods, just for comparison.
And so on Tuesday afternoon I went to Bea and Jerry's house, with high expectations
that were amply rewarded. Understand, this is a mushroom I've not seen in the wild (or anywhere else for that matter. Neither had Carol, my mushroom maven friend.)
I enthusiastically ooh-ed and aah-ed. Jerry said he'd never seen it in this location before but there was another place where it has been observed previously. Why didn't we go have a look.
So Jerry got the Gator, I was passenger, and off we went to the second site. And indeed there were more hen of the woods. Mushrooms often repeat, same place, same season. These were somewhat past prime by a few days, but still worth gathering. Jerry thought for a minute. Hen of the woods grow at the base of oak trees. There are numerous oak trees along the old unpaved road. Did I think . . . . ? Of course it could be, might be, was worthwhile. So off we went, slowly bumping down the road, looking from side to side.
"Stop!" I yelled, stepping out of the Gator almost before it came to a stop. Over a fallen log, through some light brush, keeping an eye out for the poison ivy but my main focus on the prize, the ruffled feathers of hen of the woods flocking around an oak tree. And they were magnificent! I gathered three, left the others.
See what we found with our foraging - a Gator full of mushrooms. Delicious mushrooms. I sauteed some and we had them with crab cakes. Jerry fried his up in some butter. I shared some with Carol and she cooked them with chicken. Happy autumn days.
UPDATE: Hen of the woods is called maitake in Japan, which means "dancing mushroom."
I asked my friend Shohei if his wife Emiko could suggest some recipes. Here is his reply.
"What a huge bundle of maitake! The first thing Emiko said was that the maitake is the best to go in what we call maitake gohan in which you cook rice with maitake and other sliced vegetables such as gobo [burdock root] and daikon. The rice needs to be seasoned with soy sauce and mirin before steaming.
"More simple ways would be to make maitake miso soup, or stir fry with butter and sprinkle soy sauce, or wrapped it up with cooking foil (just like making baked potato) and cook in oven and apply butter or soy sauce according to taste. Needless to say that the mushroom goes well on any soups.
"Both Emiko and myself were pleased to see you in the photo.
Emiko said that you look cute. (Maitake Power!)" - 9 October 2009
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