Mobile, Alabama: I Want to Eat Them

 

I look at them in the wild. I look at my pictures of them. 

I crave them. I want very, very much to bite into them. 

Seductive mushroom. Mobile, Alabama. July 2022. Credit: Mzuriana.

I fantasize about their texture, their flavor. Surely the taste would be a limb-melting union of a warmed English muffin, buttery. Soft like the fluffiest of pancakes and yet with a bit of resistance to my teeth. The lightest feathered dusting of cornflour up top, and porous pockets within.

Seductive mushroom. Mobile, Alabama. July 2022. Credit: Mzuriana.

Seductive mushroom. Mobile, Alabama. July 2022. Credit: Mzuriana.

Seductive mushroom. Mobile, Alabama. July 2022. Credit: Mzuriana.

Alas, I have yet to discover their name, and maybe they could kill me. 

 

My cumulative collection of mushrooms here: 

 

Mobile, Alabama: Fungus Foray at Historic Blakeley State Park

Petite white mushroom, Historic Blakeley State Park, Alabama. October 2021.

 

Mushrooms. Umami. Mmmm.

Despite their predilection for growing on dead stuff, mushrooms are often pretty, or at least intriguing, and to bite one is to transport me to a sensual reverie of flavor, aroma, texture, and chewiness. Earthy.

Fungi Farm, a local commercial mushroom farm, hosted a mushroom foraging foray at Historic Blakeley State Park in early October.

Mushroom, Historic Blakeley State Park, Alabama. October 2021.

 

'twas hot and sweaty work, but so satisfying to be in the woods. We were a group of at least 25 people.

One of my favorites was this velvety mushroom that reminded me of the so-soft lamb's ear leaves. And on its underside, you could leave your fingerprint. 

Mushroom, Historic Blakeley State Park, Alabama. October 2021.

Mushroom, Historic Blakeley State Park, Alabama. October 2021.

Major lesson learned from the foray: Bring a pocket notebook! Alan, a Fungi Farm principal, helped identify the mushrooms we found, and although the names of many remain rooted in my head, the matching of same with the samples are fuzzy. Like said mushroom above. But some names include (mixing common names and scientific names of individuals and genus) turkey tail, false turkey tail, boletes, russula, and .......

 Below is a sample of the group's foraging finds.

Mushroom, Historic Blakeley State Park, Alabama. October 2021.

A slide show below on my cumulative mushroom collection over the years and locales.

 

 

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