A while ago a video on cooking mushrooms started circulating in the online community that turned a lot of heads, at least in my world. In a nutshell, the video discussed the benefits in depth (see the video) of adding water to mushrooms before they’re sautéed. At first, I thought l “ok science guy, the…
Fresh Mushroom Recipes
Gnocchi with Chicken of the Woods Lemon Cream
In the world of wild mushrooms, chicken of the woods is pretty special. It’s striking, bright orange, and easy to ID, sure, but the flavor might the most unique thing about it. I’ve cut large, young chickens off a tree and had them gush orange juice down my arms as I cut–not the average experience…
Burdock Flower Stalk and Mushroom Vegetable Soup
Burdock flower stalks have an interesting, grassy flavor that has a tendency to meld into the background–it’s just not as flavor-forward as the roots. For me, the texture is really where this easily harvested part of the vegetable shines, as it’s tender and takes only a few minutes to cook, where burdock roots take digging,…
Roasted Chicken or Hen of the Woods Stock
One of the best parts about hunting mushrooms (and other things) is that, not only do you get to bear witness to the incredible volume of nature’s bounty, you get to take it home, too, and when the mushroom patch is bumpin, or when the blueberries are fruiting heavy, you’ll find yourself, at the end…
Baked Oyster Mushroom Croutons
At the tail end of morel season, we’ll start to see others coming up, especially if we get some rain in the Midwest like we did last week–it poured, and poured. My favorite are the first flushes of young chicken of the woods that come up, sometimes even while I’m out hunting morels, if I’m…
Braised Burdock and Wild Mushrooms
Ever since I figured out a reasonably efficient way to dig burdock roots, I’ve been eating it every which way. Kinpira was my real breakthrough. Sure, I opened up a restaurant featuring burdock as a local ingredient, but back then I cooked it like a European would, generally with dairy, which is fine, but the…
Andy’s Morel and Ramp Spaghetti
Just about every year I try to get out and hunt a few morels with my old chef, friend and mentor Chef Andy Lilja, former Chef de Cuisine of Heartland, Executive Chef of il Vesco Vino, I Nonni, and many others. We usually try to get permission to hunt some land near Frontenac that reliably…
Basic Pheasant Back Broth
After morel season as we get into summer, the pheasant back / dryad saddle / Cerioporus squamosus will still be out, not in the staggering numbers we see during the height of the late spring season, but still out and plentiful. They’re not spring mushrooms though, and finding tender, succulent ones is far more difficult…
Morels Stuffed with Morel Sauce
Morels stuffed with morel sauce is exactly what it sounds like: pretty much the ultimate stuffed morel, at least to me. One year during the spring hunting season, I ended up feeling gluttonous (and victorious) as I picked morel after morel, and after bringing them home and drying, I found I’d forgotten about the rest…
Nettle Pancakes with Goat Cheese and Wild Mushrooms
Wait, nettle what? Yep, stinging nettle pancakes. Savory pancakes were a vegetarian standby at a couple different restaurants I worked at, and Chef Russell Klein of James Beard nominated Meritage in St. Paul ran a version of them on their menu that often stayed most of the year, changing up the flavors as the seasons…
Dryad Saddles with Garlic, Soy, and Onion Greens
A quick saute of dryad saddles (Cerioporus squamosus / pheasant back) with garlic, soy and a healthy handful of onion leaves is probably my new favorite way to eat these spring mushrooms that are so abundant during morel season, and especially nice to see when the morels are hiding. Their flavor is so funky and…
Gyromitra Gratinée
I’ve been eating Gyromitra korfii occasionally for a few years now, but haven’t shared too much about them, well, because they’re Gyromitra. Like certain plants containing problem compounds that are also staple foods (chokecherries and cyanogenic glycosides like amygdalin, for example) I had an inkling that the thousands of years of ethnobotanical evidence of consumption…
Scallopini with Pickled Wild Mushrooms and Brown Butter
I tell people over and over to make mushroom conserve when they have a great harvest of small buttons, especially chanterelles: golden chanterelles, hedgehogs, blue chanterelles especially, although lobster mushrooms and polypores like chickens, hens, and Ischnoderma work good too. See the master recipe for mushroom conserve here. The reason isn’t because I eat pickled…