Foraging the Giant Puffball

It's a good time for foraging here in NY. We have been getting lots of goodies. Just last week we scored a haul of Chicken of the Woods and Puffball mushrooms as well as white oak acorns and plantain (not the banana!). I needed to get more plantain before the frost to make my healing salves. My husband was after those acorns, he is going to make acorn flour out of them. If I don't eat them all first as a snack!

This is a lovely white Puffball Mushroom. I set those two brown ones in the background to show you what not to eat. A Puffball is good when it's all white, feels firm and a bit spongy. When they are brown they are past eating and have moved on to their spore making phase. They are quite large and easy to spot. I grabbed two this size, but left a larger one for the next human or animal forager.

You can see how easy the dirty outside peels right off. You should not eat this mushroom raw. In fact it's best to not eat any raw mushrooms.

I treated the first Puff like tofu, sauteed and seasoned with cajun spices. That's my default way of cooking and it's always tasty. But since I had so much of this mushroom I decided to experiment.

 This idea came to me while I was slicing it up. The slices really held their shape, which made me think of eggplant. Puffball parmigiana was born! 

Here you can see what the inside looks like, the texture was very good this way. There is no poison lookalike for this mushroom, so feel free to forage up some yourselves.

Morning Mushroom Walk

 We are experiencing a NY heat wave, so we haven't been in the woods lately.  The heat makes us droopy and the most annoying loving bugs are out.  My family is missing the nature walks that are such a integral part of our life. This morning we set out extra early to avoid the heat and the bugs.

I didn't think that we would see so many mushrooms, the burning sun dries them up quickly. 

We were happily surprised that there were so many.

We stopped to eat our breakfast and the girls fed the fish.

Enjoying my morning tea on a nice shady rock, looking forward to autumn.

a sucker for mushrooms

With the variety of shapes, colors and flavors, I just can't resist mushrooms. They are so clean and easy to cook.

Especially when they are packaged like this! So cute and tasty, I can't say no.

Breakfast is one of my favorite times for mushrooms, with scrambled eggs and basil...

or cabbage and fried egg.

In salad

In soup

Anywhere is right for mushrooms!

small things

My daughters gave me these small and wonderful gifts. Teeny things seem more precious and magical. My 15yo had a little acorn 3D printed for me and my 11yo crocheted the tiniest fly agaric mushrooom. I love them both! 

Well, here's a small thing that was not supposed to be so small. I have a bad habit of not making size gauge swatches before starting a project. Eager to get going I just start knitting. In this case I knitted a whole sweater and then realized that I have a sweater way too tiny for me. I'll sew up the side seams later today and then I'll know how small it really is. That will determine which daughter will be getting a new sweater.

I got this lovely Cubics interchangeable circular needle set for Christmas and have started the sweater seen here on the cover of New England Knits. All of the sweaters in this book are done on circulars. Starting my new year of knitting off right, I did make a swatch for the correct size this time. 

Wishing you all a Very Excellent New Year!!!

Foraging Fun: Chicken-of-the-Woods

We went out looking for tree nuts and ended up instead with this lovely Chicken-of-the-Woods mushroom. My husband was the one to spot it, as I tramped right over it! It is also called Sulpher Shelf and it is a favorite foraged mushroom because not only is it very nice to eat, but there are no poison lookalikes. Some folks say it really doesn't taste like chicken, I think it does. The texture is very much like chicken breast. Like tofu it will become whatever you flavor it to be. Really, if you didn't know this was a mushroom, wouldn't you think this sliced up bit is cooked chicken breast? The black and white feather is turkey, found near the mushroom.

Chicken-of-the-Woods grows on trees, logs and roots. Bring a sharp knife, you'll have to slice it off. Look at this color! We found two this size, but some bunches can be huge. It you are lucky enough to come across a giant clump you should cook it at once if you won't be able to eat it all within a couple of days. After it's cooked, freeze it and throw it into soups and stews, rice dishes, casseroles or pasta as you want it. You can also dry it out to store it, but it requires more fat to cook it in to rehydrate. 

The underside ranges from light yellow to white. They are best eaten when they are young and tender. When they get big they are hard and woody. In that case I would just trim off the very tips to eat.

You can bake it, braise it or as I did here, saute it. Since finding this Chicken-of-the-Woods was a surprise treat I had to fit it into my already planned lunch, curried pumpkin soup. We came home from our foraging walk hungry. As the soup was heating up I sauteed the mushroom. Very tasty, like crispy bits of fried chicken.

You will find these mushrooms growing in shady woods and sunny city parks. We found ours on the grounds of Sunnyside, Washington Irving's home. As I've said, there are no poison lookalikes for Chicken-of-the-Woods, so if you are new to mushroom hunting, this is a good one to start with.

Making Mushrooms

This has been a week for mushrooms. I was feeling a bit lousy with a cold on Easter morning. Puffy head, runny nose, I sat in church trying to ignore it. My daughter knew just the perfect moment to pull this out of her bag. "Your Easter present", she said and she handed me this adorable crocheted mushroom. Yay! That cheered me on to listen to the Easter message and feed a bunch of people afterwards. It continues to work it's magic whenever I see it. When my daughter was little she was always giving me cute things that she made. Something made out of clay with too many eyes, a scribble drawing that said "I mad thi3 for you" (translation: I made this for you.). But, lately when she writes me a note or makes me something it is worth more to me than all those sweet little scraps from when she was younger. She is 13 now and she knows me more as an equal human being than the "mom" person I was to her when she was small. When the girls were very little sometimes the days were hectic and I longed for them to end so we could all just get some sleep. Now, the days are never long enough to do all the things we want to do. If you have little ones and feel sad thinking about them growing up remember they are still the same people, only much much more interesting. 

A friend forwarded me an email about a homeschool class about growing mushrooms, "Thought this was right up your alley", she said. She was so right. Even though I was on the tail end of my stinky cold we went. We "planted" shitake mushrooms. The first step was to go into the woods where we each got to pick our own host logs. They had a lot of downed trees due to hurricane Sandy, the Red Oak logs were pre-cut for us in manageable sizes. We carried them back and drilled holes into them where the shitake spawn was to be put. Here's my gal doing the drilling.

Next was the inoculation process. Shooting the spawn (which is mixed with sawdust) into the holes.

Next , melted wax is brushed over each hole to seal in the spawn to keep it from drying out.

There they are, logs filled with shitake spawn waiting to grow yummy mushrooms. I can't help but think of the perfect timing of this experience for us, it being Easter week. With thoughts fresh in my mind about Jesus and his resurrection, about how he always makes a way for seemingly dead things to become new. You know these mushrooms cannot even grow on a living log? It has to be decaying. Without the death of theses trees the new amazingly useful "fruit" could never be born.

Christmas Doings

Now that the doing is over, I can relax and look back on what was done.  Here is my latest advent wreath, I make a new one each year. Of course I  feel the need to sneak mushrooms and acorns into the  decor whenever possible. Sure the mushrooms are fake but they made it look much nicer, like a walk in the woods.

I was inspired by the The Complete Dickens Christmas issue of The Storybook Home Journal to make this Christmas pie. It is a puff pastry 'package' filled with beef, carrots and gravy. I enlisted my husband's help, an extra pair of hands made the process go smoothly. While he cut out the decorative shapes I worked quickly getting the filling to stay in the dough parcel. He came up with the idea to paint the "berries" before baking with beet juice to make them that pretty red.

My new fish and fungus apron. My friend Andrea, who always knows what I like, gifted me with this mushroom print dish towel. Much too crisp and nice to wipe up slops, I decided to make it into an apron adding an interesting fish print I love but so far have had no use for.

Who is that cutie in my apron pocket? Her name is Mei and she is our new guinea pig. Over the holidays we lost two of our beloved piggies, Penny and Pumpkin. Our remaining girl, Woogie has not been doing well finding herself alone for the first time in her life. She has lived with us and her two cage sisters for the last five years. Yesterday we brought lovable Mei into the family. Woogie has perked up and is acting like her old self again. 

Fall & Mushroom Hunting

With summer activities over we are getting back to a quieter rythm of learning. Lots of nature walks and collecting things to study. Mushrooms pop out of the green, soon to be brown landscape, surprising us with their unique colors and shapes. Mushrooms add a freshness to the same well known paths. We never know what we will see from one week to the next. From the minuscule to the monsterous. Letting my younger daughter lead me down a path we’d never been, we found these adorable lemon yellow spotted mushrooms. 

We usually take a few mushrooms home to look up in the field guides. But sometimes if there is only one and it looks really perfect where it is, we'll take a picture so it can remain there to delight the next passerby.  I can’t  believe these colors! My first really purple mushrooms. Of course I automatically think, “How can I wear this?”. The softness of this purple needs to be a sweater or shawl to wrap me up in.

O.k., this bunch was not hunted, but bought. You never know where cute inspiration will pop up. These happened to be at an asian grocery store where I regularly go for my nori and condiments. I couldn’t pass by this pure white bunch of cuteness. They are all connected, growing out of one base. I wanted them to keep their shape and texture, so I cut them apart and dipped them in an eggy batter. I shallow fried them so they were crunchy, while keeping their natural chewy texture.

Of course field guides are the best for identifying mushrooms, but the book ‘Katya’s Book of Mushrooms' is a very good way to introduce children to the fun of mushroom hunting. Katya’s love of mushrooms, whimsical drawings, and overall joyous spirit make it one of my favorites, even as an adult.

After the Rain

It has been raining here a lot. A whole lot. Like every day. I found myself slipping into “snowed in” mode. For me that means not leaving the house, reading, sewing and baking. That’s alright when it really is snowing. But it’s Spring. I should be out there planting, wandering, foraging, smelling Spring, being dazzled by the colors. Finally there was a break. We were sitting at the table reading. I was thinking about what to bake and out it came. The sun! I said to the girls “We need to get out, now! This might not last long.” We ran off immediately for a woodsy walk. 

I am so glad we did. It seems we were not the only ones rejoicing in the sudden break in the rain, all kind of critters were scampering around us. The birds were shaking the water off their feathers and singing. So many mushrooms had popped up everywhere. Even a snake seemed to be enjoying the sun, stretched out relaxing so close to us I could touch him.

My advice is to get out there and grab the blessings while you can. When it rains again you will wish that you had. 

(The photo is of my little one playing with some interesting clumps of mushrooms. She was making believe that she was the "Mushroom Lady",  that her umbrella was a giant mushroom and that she was causing the mushrooms to grow. )

Christmas baking

The snow is piled up outside. The tree is trimmed with favorite ornaments. Fairies, mushrooms, nesting birds and woodland critters adorn it's branches. Oh, and the red lights are twinkling, I do love my red lights. The Christmas music is playing. It's time to get baking. As a child of the 70's (not the healthy hippie 70's) I was raised on a lot of packaged food. Potatoes and cakes came from boxes and vegetables came out of cans. But, come Christmas time my mom would bake cookies from scratch and she did it very well. As far back as I can remember Christmas we had the green acorn cookies. Mom would make the dough with the big wooden spoon, no mixers here. Then she molded each little acorn by hand. After baked and cooled she dipped each one in melted chocolate to make the acorn cap. They are buttery, kind of like shortbread, but flavored with almond extract. When I got married I started making them our tradition too. This year I also made a batch of sugar cookies that we have yet to decorate. They are from my late Grandma Jean's 1963 "Cooky Book". They are called wonderland cookies and we cut them out in fun animal shapes: pigs, owls, chicks, rabbits plus hearts and diamonds. It's just not Christmas though without the green acorn cookies. That big, gorgeous brown glass acorn ornament is a new gift from a special friend who really knows what I like.


Each Christmas I make a birthday cake for Jesus. I also like to make a buche de noel. It's a french roll cake filled with whipped cream. It's a less sweet alternative to the buttercream iced birthday cake. I decorate it with merengue mushrooms and strawberries. Of course I take any excuse to put cute little mushrooms on my table!


When serving this cake to company, one friend was notably disgusted to be eating mushrooms with his cake! I took this as a mighty big compliment at the realism of the little shrooms.

The Monster Mushroom

While enjoying an autumn stroll around a favorite local haunt this past sunday the girls discovered this crazy huge mushroom. We didn’t pick it, it was already plucked and lying on the ground. As I’ve mentioned before on this blog, I dig mushrooms and I am always on the prowl for new specimens. I have never seen this type this large before, so it was quite a big deal. It immediatly brought to my mind the following quote from the book The Supper of the Lamb by Robert Farrar Capon.


“And the mushroom? Ah! It is proof of creation ex nihilo, the paradigm of the marvelously solid unnecessariness of the world. How anything so nearly nothing could at the same time be so emphatically something- how the Spirit brooding upon the face of the waters could have brought forth this... well, words fail, and mystery reigns. “

rain rain go away

I actually really like rain, except when it is relentless and destroys my tomatoes. We’ve been having an awful lot of rain lately. Maybe that is why these little umbrellas are popping up all over the lawn.

My Mushrooms

For the last couple of years I have been devoting much of my time in nature seeking out mushrooms. I have taken countless pictures of them. I can't always keep track of labeling who they are because they are too numerous. So many shapes , colors, sizes, textures. It's never boring and each time we come across a new one it's special. Here are a couple of beauties from our most recent walk. The jelly one looked like amber with the sun behind it and the two tiny guys in that amazing moss forest were each as small as a fingernail.