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Ramaria botrytis

Ramaria botrytis or pink tipped edible coral mushroomsRamaria botrytis. These are the best coral mushroom for the table I’ve eaten in the Midwest, and, most importantly, by far the easiest species to identify (they’re pink!). There isn’t a lack of coral mushrooms in my area, but really good ones can be tough to pin down. With the exception of another yellow variety that’s really chunky and looks like golden cauliflower, and is even more rare, the botrytis is my favorite Ramaria, and I know more than one mushroom professional that shares my opinion.

“Young, stubby pink-or purple-tipped branches are the most readily recognized of all the Ramaria” -David Arora 

I’ve eaten a few others in the genus, but I haven’t bothered to really get to know those like I have this one, which should tell you something-they’re worth it. I first ate these about 5 years ago, and I’ve waited to share them until now, as it was difficult to keep them pink, and I kept finding them without having my tripod with me in the woods.

More importantly than the color, was that I wanted to repeatedly eat, and serve them to others, just to make sure none of us got loose bowels, which is the common danger I see listed regarding mushrooms in the genus. Personally, I have never had any stomach issues from eating any Ramaria, but I also usually only consume 2-3 ounces (raw weight) of cooked mushrooms in a sitting when I eat, unless it’s hen of the woods season.

Ramaria botrytis or pink tipped edible coral mushrooms

A cross section: note the large amount of stalk/fleshy base, and the tight branches. This is a mature mushroom.

Habitat

The only trick with the Ramaria botrytis is finding them, and it’s a trick. I searched for years and found nothing. Now, I have a couple spots and, like other mycorrhizal (perennial) mushrooms, I can count on them to come up at roughly the same time and place each year, give or take a week or two. My botrytis are hardwood lovers, and they grow with oaks in each place I pick them, generally in mid to late August, although in other places I’ve read they can grow with conifers.

Color

These two characteristics are the biggest ID tells I can share with you. First, the color-they’re pink, not red, purple, tan, orange or bright yellow like other Ramaria I see. The botrytis is absolutely, positively pink, pink, pink. But, Botany being a slightly malleable science, it’s unfortunately not that simple. The pink color of the botrytis, from my experience, can be very pronounced when young, but, as they mushrooms grow, the color, in the majority of specimens I’ve harvested, will be muted, or only visible on the tips.

Spore print of Ramaria botrytis the pink tipped coral mushroom
Spore print of Ramaria botrytis the pink tipped coral mushroom
Close up.

To make things a little trickier, I have even had the color of mushrooms I’ve harvested fade while they sit under refrigeration (see above and below). I remember bringing my first pink coral in to impress my line cooks, and, after sitting in the fridge for a night, it was tan. There was only a faint pink was left on the tips-not nearly as impressive as when I plucked it from the ground. So, know that the tell-tale pink can wane in age, or be relegated to the young, meristematic growing tips. To clarify a bit, I assume the color fading to tan-ish is due to the ochre spore print, as you can see above.

Ramaria botrytis or pink tipped edible coral mushrooms

Pink-ish. Above is immediately after I brought the large cluster home, the pink was still noticeable.

Above is the cluster in this post immediately after I brought it home, below is after 24 hours under refrigeration. After a night in the fridge the pink color was barely noticeable, and it’s taken me years to find another batch of specimens for me to prove to you that, they’re actually pink, until a few weeks ago.

Ramaria botrytis or pink tipped edible coral mushrooms

After 24 hours in the fridge, this botrytis turned from pink to…tan-ish, presuambly from the ochre/tan-colored spores.

Shape (Think Cauliflower) 

After a few good rains the Ramaria can be all over in hardwood forests where I hunt, but, most of the others have straight branching tips that connect loosely at a base, in a sense, they can look more like under sea corals than Ramaria botrytis. Below is Ramaria botrytis, followed by another, unidentified coral I’ve eaten and enjoyed that fruits at the same time, both have very tight branches when young, and a “cauliflower-y” look.

The botrytis (and other corals I prefer) are chunky, and by that, I think it’s helpful to think of them more like cauliflower than like corals. It may not be a scientific explanation, but the intuition of searching for the cauliflower shape hasn’t failed me yet.

Yellow edible Ramaria mushrooms currently unidentified

An as of yet unidentified yellow, delicious coral mushroom. Note how both these, and the Ramaria botrytis above them both have a chunky shape that visibly resembles cauliflower.

Ramaria botrytis or pink tipped edible coral mushrooms

Funny enough, there’s also a cauliflower mushroom (Sparassis) and the Ramaria I eat look more like cauliflower than the mushroom that bears the common name. Either way, here’s a couple bullets I find helpful, as Ramaria botrytis, generally speaking

  • Can be visibly rounded at the base or chunky, and almost bulbous in some cases (this is also a characteristic I look for in other corals, specifically yellow ones).
  • In prime stage they’ll look like they could be easily sliced, without the tips breaking apart, as they’re composed of a higher proportion of base than branching tips.
  • The tips, especially when young, are very crowded, not tall and erect like other Ramaria, from what I’ve seen, until they’re pretty mature.
  • In maturity, the tips can be pink, with the rest of the mushroom getting tan.
  • The cauliflowery base, and flesh of the mushroom is white, inside and out.
  • I taste and spit a small piece before I pick, these should taste mild and pleasant, like a good mushroom, some bitter look-alikes are reputed to exist.
  • Repeat after me: cauliflower, cauliflower, cauliflower, pink, pink, pink.
Ramaria botrytis or pink tipped edible coral mushrooms

Pinky.

Ramaria vs Crown Corals 

Bear with me for a moment, some of you may be thinking:

“I like coral mushrooms, I pick the crown tipped ones from wood all the time”

In a sense, crown corals (Artomyces pyxidatus) are coral mushrooms, as they look like corals, with their branch-y, under the sea look, and they share a closer relationship to Ramaria than something like, say, a hen of the woods. The relation ends there though, and, if you’ve been studying your mushrooms you’ll have noticed that Artomyces is a completely different genus than Ramaria. Another difference, and am easy way to instantly tell the two apart is to remember that crown tipped corals grow directly from wood-they’re decomposers, true Ramaria grow terrestrially (directly from the ground), and are mycorrhizal, living in harmony with the trees, and helping them absorb nutrients.

Artomyces phyxidatus or crown tipped coral mushrooms

Crown tipped coral mushrooms, or Artomyces phyxidatus, always grow directly from wood, and are brittle. These are not Ramaria.

Most importantly to me, these two mushrooms don’t cook the same. Ramaria are firm, sliceable, say like a hen of the woods when young, and they’re heavy. Crown corals are always brittle, generally small, light weight, and cook down to a floppy pile, Ramaria can be cooked in a pan and browned, fried, roasted, boiled, pickled, grilled, (you get the idea) and will hold their shape any way you cook them.

Seared prawns with coral or ramaria mushrooms, heirloom garlic butter sauce and lacinato kale

I love Ramaria with fish for a funky surf and turf combo. Note how the mushrooms are broken into clusters to retain their natural shape.

Cooking 

These are a breeze to work with. The tight branching means they often don’t get debris stuck in them, I trim the dirt off the base in the field, as much to remove dirt as to inspect for larvae (yes the bugs like these, but it’s not horrible) Compared to other mushrooms, they usually don’t require much more work, I may swish a cluster in cold water here and there as needed, and dry on a towel.

For cooking, I never just chop them up. Their shape is part of what makes them special, so I try to keep that in mind. My advice is to break them into clusters, or slice them thick to retain their character. Below are a few recipes I’ve made specifically using Ramaria, but they’re transferable to plenty of other preparations too.

Recipes

  • Coral Mushroom-Rice Bowl
  • Vietnamese Chicken Noodle Soup 
  • Seared Prawns with Kale and Coral Mushrooms 

 

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🌱Ephemeral Week🌱 Last entry. I’ve saved t 🌱Ephemeral Week🌱

Last entry. I’ve saved the smallest, fern gulliest plant for last. 

False Mermaid Weed (Floerkea proserpinacoides) is a good little plant Sam Thayer showed me. It’s tiny, as in all the photos are from me on my belly, in a wet ditch. It’s so small it’s hard to get the camera to even focus on it (see pic with my finger for scale). 

Mermaid weed likes wet areas, like ditches and spots that hold a bit of water (perfect mosquito habitat😁). 

Like chickweed, Floerkia greens are like nature’s Microgreens. They’re in the Limnanthaceae, (a new-ish group of brassicas) and like the Toothwort form earlier this week, you’ll taste a strong mustard-family flavor in a mouthful of their tender stems. 

They’re literally wild mustard sprouts, and, unlike other wild sprouts (garlic mustard 🤬) they stay sprouts, and, they actually taste good. 

It has a wide range over much of the eastern and western U.S., and is listed as secure globally, but is endangered in some states and shouldn’t be disturbed in those places. 

I’m lucky enough to have some large colonies near me so I do clip a few handfuls each year-my annual reward for removing some of the garlic mustard nearby, that, along with atvs, dirt bikes, and contamination from local water pollution, is one of the biggest threats to this tiny green. 

#floerkiaproserpinacoides 
#wildsprouts #mustardsprouts #ferngully #tiny #foraging #mermaid #🧜‍♀️
🌱Ephemeral Week🌱 Virginia Bluebells (Merten 🌱Ephemeral Week🌱

Virginia Bluebells (Mertensia virginica) are one of the most beautiful harbingers of spring I know, as well as one of the most delicious. 

They’re in the Borage family, along with the namesake plant, Comfrey (which I only eat a few flowers of occasionally) and Honeywort. 

The flavor of the greens, like borage, has a rich flavor some people might describe as mushroomy or fishy, but after a just a few moments of cooking (30-60 seconds) they get mild and delicious, with a subtle bitterness. It’s a good bitter though-nothing like dandelions or garlic mustard that aren’t fit to be in the same basket, let alone on the same plate. 

The shoots are sweet and delicious, much more mild than the greens. As they can grow to be over a foot long, they’re almost more of a vegetable than a leafy green, depending on when you harvest them. 

Bluebells love moist, rich soil, but you don’t have to go to the woods to get them. Many people know Virginia Bluebells as a garden plant, and they can make a great edible addition to your landscape.

#virginiabluebells #foraging #ephemerals #springwildflowers #wildfoodlove #mertensiavirginica
🌱Ephemeral Week🌱 Narrow-leaved Wild Leek / 🌱Ephemeral Week🌱

Narrow-leaved Wild Leek / White Ramp (Allium burdickii) 

If you’re in a ramp patch you might occasionally see some with white stems (pic 1,2). These are a cousin to the more common variety with much larger leaves and red stems (pic 3,4,5)

Allium burdickii is not as common as the red-stemmed variety, and in every ramp patch I’ve been in, the white ramp is heavily outnumbered. 

Where I harvest, I like to leave them alone, and mark the areas where they grow with sticks or middens on the ground so I can go back in the fall and help them spread their seeds. I also try and remove garlic mustard when I see it-a much more imminent threat in my mind to ramps than foragers out to gather some leaves. 

2020 was a banner year for ramp seeds, and you can still help the plants right now (pic 7) as some seed heads are still full and would love for you to give them a shake as you walk by. 

#alliumburdickii #ramps #ephemerals #foraging #spring
🌱Ephemeral Week🌱 #4: Erythronium leaves E 🌱Ephemeral Week🌱

#4: Erythronium leaves 

Erythronium (Trout Lily) are another ephemeral that I see widespread in my ramp patches, there’s at least 32 species world-wide, with at least one endangered species in MN (Dwarf Trout Lily). 

They’re a beautiful, delicious plant I eat every year, but I can’t recommend serving them to the general public. Plenty of people say these are edible, but also emetic if eaten in “quantity”. 

I can tell you, at least with E. albidum and E. americanum I’ve eaten, that some people are much more sensitive than others, so if you want to make a salad to serve people, make sure they’re comfortable eating it, and use a few leaves as a garnish. 

Funny enough, I didn’t learn about these from a foraging book. Like knotweed, I learned about them from one of my favorite chefs: Michel Bras, one of the most influential chefs of the turn of the 21 century. 

Any chef that works with wild plants owes a debt to Bras. His book, although a little dated now, still teaches me new things all the time. While flipping through the book I also caught a recipe using tansy flowers 😳 that I’d probably pass on. 

The whitefish crusted with sunflower seeds is a dish of mine from 2012, and an example of how I eat the leaves: a few at a time, as a garnish. 

#troutlily #erythronium #michelbras #ephemerals #foraging
🌱Ephemeral Week🌱 Plant #3: Cutleaf Toothwor 🌱Ephemeral Week🌱

Plant #3: Cutleaf Toothwort (Cardamine concatenata) is another beautiful spring wildflower that loves to grow in the same habitat you’ll see ramps and spring beauty. 

Its small at first, but grows to a worthy size for eating as it flowers. It’s related to cabbage and mustard greens (Brassicaceae) and eating just a few leaves will give you a potent, spicy pop of mustard-family flavor reminiscent of horseradish. 

Eaten in combination with other things, like in a salad, the flavor becomes submissive and you’ll barely know it’s there. 

Some people eat the spicy roots shaped like canine teeth, but for the work I hardly think they’re worth it. 

A great wild spring green for the salad bowl-eat them leaves, tender stem, flowers and all🤤. 

#cutleaftoothwort #cadamineconcatenata #ephemeral #springedibles #foraging #wildfoodlove
🌱Ephemeral Week🌱 Plant #2 is Virginia water 🌱Ephemeral Week🌱

Plant #2 is Virginia waterleaf, and, I’m cheating a bit as it’s semi-ephemeral. The plant comes up in spring and goes to flower, but gives a second harvest of fresh growth in the fall, where other ephemerals I know do not. 

This is a great starter wild green-easy to recognize with the splashes of white on the leaves that may or may not be present. After you learn it though, don’t be surprised if, like me, you eventually pass it up for more delicious greens nearby. 

The plant gets tough quick, and the flavor is..meh, so I usually have small amounts of very young greens in blends of blanched and sautéed mixes. 

My favorite part is the wee flower buds, that, if you get at the right time, can be harvested in decent quantity and are good steamed as they’ll soak up oil sautéed. 

#hydrophyllumvirginianum #waterleaf #foraging #fueledbynature #weedeater
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