Chanterelle time

Redneck cuisine from the hunting camp.
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GLS
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Chanterelle time

Post by GLS »

Friday I found those in the first photo. Second photo yesterday. Difference is size is most likely due to soil quality. All were found in my usual spots seen from a low speed cruise along woods roads. They are the zucchinis of the mushroom world; when they flush they are abundant. From now until the first cool snap. They'll flush with 24 hours of a good rain.
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Re: Chanterelle time

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I need to find some. Never had them before
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Re: Chanterelle time

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Beautiful knife you got there as well
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Re: Chanterelle time

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Thanks. It's a simply made Opinel mushroom foraging knife. Rather inexpensive, but it's special because my daughter bought it for me in France when she taught high school English for the French Ministry of Education almost 7 years ago. She also had shown me the ropes on finding chants. She worked at a restaurant in Athens while at UGA and learned to forage for mushrooms from some of her co-workers. Time flies...Gil
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Re: Chanterelle time

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Awesome story to tell along with it, good for you
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Re: Chanterelle time

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GLS wrote: June 14th, 2020, 5:48 pm Thanks. It's a simply made Opinel mushroom foraging knife. Rather inexpensive, but it's special because my daughter bought it for me in France when she taught high school English for the French Ministry of Education almost 7 years ago. She also had shown me the ropes on finding chants. She worked at a restaurant in Athens while at UGA and learned to forage for mushrooms from some of her co-workers. Time flies...Gil
Great story!
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Re: Chanterelle time

Post by ICDEDTURKES »

Awesome. Our local DNR has class on identification. Might go next spring. Since ash and elm have died morel hunting sucks. Need new targets.
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Re: Chanterelle time

Post by howl »

Nice haul. The big smooth ones like that are just starting here. Hands down my favorite mushrooms.
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Re: Chanterelle time

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Chants are not only the most flavorful IMHO, the season for them is one of the longest in the mushroom world. They start flushing here in early June after the first downpour and will continue to flush after heavy rain until the first cool snap in October in these parts. Morels aren't around here but where they exist, the season is a short two to three weeks window. I gather as many chants I can find and the surplus are sauteed in butter/olive oil and broken down into meal size batches and vacuum bagged and frozen. Off season I pop one of the bags into hot water to heat it and use in omelets, pot pies, pasta or smother a steak or wild bird with it after the bird is cooked. The flavor is far better than reconstituted dehydrated ones.
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Re: Chanterelle time

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I’m going to have to try this. Are there any other mushrooms that resemble them that may be harmful and cause issues? Or is it safe for a novice to gather some?
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Re: Chanterelle time

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The Jack O'Lantern is cited as being close in appearance, but it grows on decaying wood and in clusters. The chants don't grow on dead wood and while there maybe a few, two or three clustered, they usually grow apart. Chants have false gills meaning they aren't frilly under the cap. The false gills also branch out unlike other mushrooms whose gills are parallel and regular. The false gills also move down the stem on the larger ones, but not necessarily when they are smaller. They also have no "sap" and have a weak fresh apricot like smell, at least to me. I find them under drip lines of live oaks, in mixed pines and hardwood areas, along creek bottoms. The easy way to find them is to cruise a woods road at slow speed and look for the color. This time of the year they stand out. It's best to cut them from the ground rather than pull them for two reasons: cutting preserves the underground structure and there's no point of adding dirt on top of the ones in your onion sack or basket. They will re-flush in the same spots throughout the season. I clean them under running water with my thumb on the top and undersides. Here's a photo of them along the road Saturday in one spot. Never eat wild mushrooms raw. Always cook them before eating. There's a red chanterelle that is much smaller--cinnibars. They are no bigger than a quarter on the cap with a small stem and are good as well. It just takes a ton to be worthwhile cutting and collecting. Since I started hunting mushrooms this time of the year, it has given me an opportunity to stay in the woods, often in the same spots I woodcock and turkey hunt. Watch out for snakes. A few years ago I came upon a canebrake rattler dozing in dappled sunlight. I luckily spotted him first. He never got agitated and I left him alone.
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Re: Chanterelle time

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Here's the underside of a large chant. Note the false gills running down the stem from the cap and the "branching" of gills. Large chants remind me of day lily blossoms. Jack O'Lanterns glow in the dark hence the name. Chants don't. The first batch I picked 8 years ago I read somewhere that mushrooms shouldn't be washed, but brushed off. Horsefeathers. The result after not washing them was like eating sandpaper. TV chef Alton Brown has disproved that mushrooms absorb a lot of water and lose flavor, etc. after washing. You've got to do it to remove the grit. Brushing won't do it. I store them for days without washing them and also after washing them. Washing them doesn't accelerate loss of freshness. Store in a paper bag so they can breathe out moisture. Sealed in plastic in the fridge will accelerate rot. If in a plastic tub, cover with a paper towel not an impermeable lid. Gil
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Re: Chanterelle time

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Thanks! That should be enough info to keep me from seeing flying monkeys and spiders on the he wall.
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Re: Chanterelle time

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You shouldn't have a problem finding and id'ing them. I don't eat any others except for Lions Mane which is a winter/fall mushroom and is easy to id. There are a few others I can safely id, but nothing is better or as plentiful than the chants. Good luck. Gil
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Re: Chanterelle time

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I’m going exploring after he next rain. Thanks
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Re: Chanterelle time

Post by ICDEDTURKES »

Anyone eat oysters. Found a grocery bag was leery even knowing didn't eat um.
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Re: Chanterelle time

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ICDEDTURKES wrote: June 17th, 2020, 2:03 pm Anyone eat oysters. Found a grocery bag was leery even knowing didn't eat um.
We eat them. They are very good. Sautéed up they go well with a good steak. Nice firm texture.
There are a few different species. Did yours look like the white ones here?
(The brown capped mushrooms are porcini.)

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One of our favorites are these meadow mushrooms "pink bellies", a species of agaricus. Closely related to the common store mushroom but much more flavor.
Down side is they have some close cousins in the "lose your lunch bunch".

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Last year was not a good year for chanterelles here, unfortunately.
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Re: Chanterelle time

Post by ICDEDTURKES »

RapscallionVermilion wrote: June 17th, 2020, 3:22 pm
ICDEDTURKES wrote: June 17th, 2020, 2:03 pm Anyone eat oysters. Found a grocery bag was leery even knowing didn't eat um.
We eat them. They are very good. Sautéed up they go well with a good steak. Nice firm texture.
There are a few different species. Did yours look like the white ones here?
(The brown capped mushrooms are porcini.)

Image

One of our favorites are these meadow mushrooms "pink bellies", a species of agaricus. Closely related to the common store mushroom but much more flavor.
Down side is they have some close cousins in the "lose your lunch bunch".

Image

Last year was not a good year for chanterelles here, unfortunately.
White ones, they were everywhere
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Re: Chanterelle time

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Rapscal, I haven't seen any porcini's around here but we do get a variety of boletes in the fall more so than now. Those pink bellies are beauts but I haven't seen them either. The boletes won't kill you but you'll wish you were dead if you eat the wrong ones. Moons ago, some Koreans picked and ate some mushrooms that resembled what they had in Asia and it was a bad move. I keep my choice of mushrooms that I pick limited. Most folks around here are comfortable identifying chanterelles. When Whole Paycheck opened for business here they sold chants for $30/lb. They had seen better days, but they sold. Gil
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Re: Chanterelle time

Post by SwampDrummin »

Where are these finds coming from? Anyone ever do any shroom hunting in Mississippi?
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Re: Chanterelle time

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SwampDrummin wrote: June 18th, 2020, 4:53 pm Where are these finds coming from? Anyone ever do any shroom hunting in Mississippi?
https://www.mdwfp.com/media/news/museum ... mushrooms/
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Re: Chanterelle time

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GLS wrote: June 18th, 2020, 3:47 pm Rapscal, I haven't seen any porcini's around here but we do get a variety of boletes in the fall more so than now. Those pink bellies are beauts but I haven't seen them either. The boletes won't kill you but you'll wish you were dead if you eat the wrong ones. Moons ago, some Koreans picked and ate some mushrooms that resembled what they had in Asia and it was a bad move. I keep my choice of mushrooms that I pick limited. Most folks around here are comfortable identifying chanterelles. When Whole Paycheck opened for business here they sold chants for $30/lb. They had seen better days, but they sold. Gil
That's the beauty of chanterelles - wonderful taste, hard to go wrong, and when you find them you often find a bunch. Even the jack-o-lantern isn't really that close, as you pointed out. It took us several years to get where we are now with the help of some good books, David Arora's books especially, which taught us about staining, spore prints, and other steps to confirm species, and with all that we eat maybe six species. I remember hearing about the Asians and the poisoning. They ate one of the deadly amanitas. A good reason not to eat any white gilled mushrooms or any mushroom with that volva cup on the base of the stem. And yet, some out here pick those red capped fly amanitas on purpose to fly with the reindeer or puke, flip of a coin.
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Re: Chanterelle time

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While puffballs are good, the amanita family before maturing resembles a small puffball, but there is a slight outline of the cap and stem when the ball is cut from top to bottom signifying amanita. Aside from books, going with a knowledgeable person is a good way to learn, especially a local from the area hunted.
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Re: Chanterelle time

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GLS wrote: June 18th, 2020, 5:05 pm
SwampDrummin wrote: June 18th, 2020, 4:53 pm Where are these finds coming from? Anyone ever do any shroom hunting in Mississippi?
https://www.mdwfp.com/media/news/museum ... mushrooms/
Gonna give the Chants a whirl next rain cycle. They also say we have morels but I’ve stumbled across them one time in maybe 15 springs, nothing like Illinois woods where they are common. Reading up it seems like the chants are more likely though.
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Re: Chanterelle time

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I took photos Sunday of other areas wherein I find the chants and got a basketful. Might not help folks farther north, but here on the coastal plain of the south, these areas described below abound. This area is about 30 miles west of the Atlantic, flat land, and an average elevation of about 65’ above sea level. In this particular area, I find chants often within the drip line of live oaks. These aren’t the straight trunk oaks of most places. These are massive, thick trunked oaks that keep leaves year round except for about a two week period when all leaves are replaced. The two depicted have trunk diameters over 6’. The also occupy well drained “hills” if a rise in elevation above swamp of 3-4’ can be considered a hill. I’ve noted before that I find chants mostly in hardwoods with scattered pines. In this area, the live oak (Quercus virginiana) seems to be the mother ship with the surrounding pines having scattered chant flushes. Photos below show the chants flushing in pine needles, other photos show oak leaves. One photo was near where I turned the truck around in the sandy road. On one side was a massive live oak with chants around and under it; on the other side of the road, I noticed chants for the first time in the pines and along the road nestled in oak leaf litter. This particular area has widespread sandy, poor soil, but has chant locations I associate with live oaks—but they also exist in areas where there are no nearby live oaks. An area 70 miles north and further inland, has better soil and the chants appear to be larger. It is 75’ feet above sea level and almost 40 miles from the Atlantic. It is still considered to be lowcountry. The live oak was a preferred ship’s timber in colonial times and through the sailing era. It is rot resistant to fresh water (rain) and was used in the construction of the ships during the infancy of the US Navy. The 2nd oldest military vessel still in commission is the USS Constitution, Old Ironsides, whose frame is made from the oak of southern live oak. The frames could be cut from the curved limbs and trunks without the need for steam bending. Here’s a fascinating video of the last sawmill in the US which still supplies live oak to shipwrights building wooden vessels. The owner of the mill and his saw are ones of a kind and there's nothing wrong with that.
https://sampsonboat.co.uk/19-milling-li ... eep-south/
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