Get ready to fall in love with wild mushrooms! Absolutely everything you need to know to make mushrooming a lifestyle choice: finding, storing, preserving, and preparing common and unusual finds.
Packed with content and lore from 25 skilled foragers around the country, Wild Mushrooms will help mushroom hunters successfully utilize their harvest, and includes practical information on transporting, cleaning, and preserving their finds. One of the best things about cooking wild mushrooms is that every time you open your dried caches, their unique aroma recalls your foraging experience creating an immediate and visceral connection back to the forest. There is no finer way to appreciate food.
You will not only learn the best ways to locate, clean, collect, and preserve your mushrooms from the experts, but safety and edibility, cooking and preservation techniques, mushroom sections and flavor profiles, and more. Recipes are categorized by 15 mushroom species, with 115 recipes in total.
Recipes include:
- Baked Brie with Chanterelle Jam
- Chanterelle and Wild Mushroom Duxelles
- Chaga and Reishi Teas
- Chicken Mushroom Parmesan
- Lobster Mushroom and Butternut Squash Soup
- Morel stroganoff
- And so many more!
From pickling to rich duxelles, soups, salads, and even mushroom teas, tinctures, jams, and sorbet, these recipes and invaluable insider tips will delight everyone from the most discerning mycophiles to brand new fungus fanatics.
Mushrooms covered:
Matsutake, Chanterelle, Lobster, Oyster, Morel, Hedgehog, Yellowfoot, Black Trumpet, Chicken of the Woods, Lions Mane, Maitake, Porcini, Truffle and Medicinal Mushrooms: Reishi, Chaga and Turkey Tail
REVIEWS for Wild Mushrooms...
"This book of marvels is generous of heart and imbued with the deep sensitivity of true foragers. The Blizzards have the rare gift of intimately knowing these wild mushrooms like old friends: their unique personalities, their eccentric culinary traits, and the special secrets to keeping them a part of your life and kitchen all year long. The superb recipes and preservation methods make this book the best wild mushroom forager’s guide to date."
—Connie Green, Wine Forest Wild Foods, author of The Wild Table
"Trent and Kristen have done a great job compiling recipes from talented foragers, telling their stories, as well as distilling down mushroom hunting knowledge only years of experience can provide.Wild Mushrooms will happily form a symbiosis with your field guides, as well as your kitchen."
—Alan Bergo, forager & chef
"Join the thrill of the hunt with foragers Kristen and Trent Blizzard in an intimate glimpse into a community of mushroomers who relish fungal feasts. Much more than a field guide or a cookbook, Wild Mushrooms offers comprehensive instructions on cleaning and preserving your haul, along with 115 savory, sweet, and medicinal recipes honed to perfection by more than two dozen chefs and home cooks who share the Blizzards’ love of wild mushrooms. They weave nearly a decade of experiences foraging in the mountain states, Pacific Northwest, and Midwest through the book, and spent over a year collecting, testing recipes, and photographing the mouthwatering creations in this handsome collection. Destined to be a leading authority in its class, this volume adds immeasurable value to the handful of wild mushroom cookbooks on the market. It manages to preserve the best of these with the conviviality of a community cookbook, but adding a professional and comprehensive focus with enough wit and wonder to provide an invaluable resource for beginners as well as seasoned mushroom hunters. The globally inspired recipes range from practical to unusual, with basic techniques like grilling, pickling, and drying elevated by more fanciful creations, including Chanterelle Apricot Sorbet, Porcini and Gruyère Gougeres, Savory Matsutake Daikon Cake, and Candy Cap Mushroom Popsicles. Interspersed with pro tips and stunning, minimalist images of each species are biographies and anecdotes from passionate mushroomers the Blizzards have come to know in their years attending festivals and joining forays across the country. I highly recommend it and look forward to sampling each and every recipe."
—Jennifer Burns Bright, PhD, food educator, travel writer, forager, and lover of all mushrooms wild and wonderful
