Forest mushrooms chanterelle
Chanterelle Mushrooms
The drought-stricken summer of 2023 meant slim pickings for Louisiana’s chanterelle mushroom foragers. The orange, fan-like mushrooms, which appear as if scattered by fairies in deeply shaded oak and beech groves after early summer rains, simply never emerged, leaving a forager to crunch haplessly through the tinder-dry forest glades where, in wetter times, he collects them by the basketful. So, this summer, the lines of thunderstorms that rolled across the Tunica Hills in late May and early June represented a welcome return to form, bringing an early flush of chanterelles that set the shaded gullies of the deep woods aglow with pops of color unmistakable in the gloom of a rainy afternoon.
After the first couple of wet days, your forager visited some favorite haunts, and came away with a basketful of plump, orange beauties—enough to play a starring role in several days’ worth of omelets, soups, stews, and sauces. It was good while it lasted. When the rain stops, or nighttime temperatures stop dipping below about 70 degrees, the bounty recedes back beneath the leaf litter, to wait for the right combination of warmth and moisture to trigger the eternal cycle to begin again.
Any advice that encourages you to eat mushrooms foraged from the woods should certainly be approached with caution, this example included.* But chanterelles, with their bright egg-yolk coloring, distinctive, fanlike shape, and apricot-like scent, make for easier
This writer discovering the jewel of the forest, chanterelles.
(and safer) identification than most. If you want to give foraging a try, the morning after heavy rain, take a basket or paper bag and set off into hilly terrain with mature oak or beech forest cover. Search deep shade beneath mature trees in damp gullies and on hillsides which might run with water during rainstorms. If you find an orange mushroom, pick it and look underneath. If it has prominent, well-formed gills, what you’ve found is a jack-‘o-lantern, which will make you quite sick. The underside of a chanterelle will feature criss-crossed veins as opposed to gills. Slice through the stem. If your stem is a uniform creamy-white color (as opposed to orange) all the way through, you’ve found a chanterelle. Look around. There will usually be more, as clusters of chanterelles tend to emerge in in the same location year after year.
Here in the Felicianas, where mid-June went hot and dry, that flush of chanterelles that burst forth a couple of weeks ago vanished as quickly as it came. But this afternoon, rolling thunder and a stirring in the treetops confirms what the weather forecast has already suggested. The next few days should bring cooler temperatures and lots of afternoon rain. If they do, this forager will be back to his regular haunts, basket in-hand, in search of that loveliest and most ephemeral bounty of a Louisiana summertime.
The subject of mushrooms as a delicacy is a favorite at Country Roads. If you're a forager, or foraging-curious, discover more stories like this one below:
"Shriek from the Garden: Strange discoveries in the summer soil"
"Fun Uses for Feliciana Fungi" : 3 recipes for locally-foraged (or sourced) mushrooms
Recipe: Bread and Butter Chanterelle Pickle
"The Taming of the Shroom: A mushroom hunt in the Honey Island Swamp"
Recipe: Chanterelle Sauce for Steak or Chicken
*Editor’s note: If you want to start foraging chanterelle or any other varieties of mushrooms, unless you’re absolutely sure what you’ve got, for heaven’s sake don’t eat them. There are many good online resources, such as the Central Louisiana Mushroom Foragers, Hunters, Growers, and Enthusiasts Facebook group where, if you post photos of your find, members will be glad to I.D. it for you.
