Cookaholics Bulletin Board

While this isn't really gardening, it's the closest forum I thought would fit.

Monsoon season came early to the mountains of SW Colorado, and while it's frustrating as a summer-loving local, it's exciting as a mushroom-picking chef. My EC has gone out a couple of times already, and come back with about a few pounds of chanterelles and porcinis. (A pittance for what's to come.)

The rains have been good, so I'm going out this weekend on my first forage. With luck I should be able to find around 5-10 lbs. of porcinis. This will increase dramatically in the next few weeks. Gotta love the mountains.

Amy

That is great Amy! We get Morel's in May here in Michigan. Lost of festivals and such go on around Mothers Day. They go for between $18.00 and $25.00 a lb. Happy hunting, I'm a little envious.

Laurie

Amy,

There's no worries about picking some wrong mushrooms?

I've had one horrible experience with foraged mushrooms in a Russian restaurant ...

Josh,

Not really. Porcinis (boletes) and chanterelles are both pretty distinctive. And, if you ever have any question, John Sir Jesse (yup, that's his real name) is a local mushroom certifier.

Amy

I want to buy a dehydrator for drying my mushrooms. (Actually, I'd just rather buy a new convection oven, which works equally as well for this purpose, but alas, it's not in the cards right now.)

I found one on Craigslist quasi-locally that is $50, including four trays. It's a Harvest Maid Garden Master. Anyone have experience with this?

Amy

Amy, that looks quite similar to mine (mine's Mr. Coffee brand - WTF?), and it works fine. I think this is one of those items where you don't have to have the fancypants model (or at least that is what I tell myself so I don't run off and buy this one).

Darcie,

There's also one of those on Craigslist for $100 obo. Hmmmm...

Amy

The supposed advantage of the Excalibur (and the less expensive STX Dehydra) is that they have horizontal drying so it dries more evenly. With the vertical models like mine, you have to rotate the trays because the stuff on the bottom gets done faster. Also, the horizontal fan models have temperature controls which most of the updraft models lack. Maybe I should check out Craigslist here in MN for one...

Looks like Harvest Maid is synonymous with American Harvest. I've had an A.H. forever (mine has a temperature dial). Rotating trays ain't all that hard. IIRC the Ronco/Popiel model doesn't actually have a fan...

So we went foraging for chantarelles today. The area we went to isn't really known for porcinis, but I think we might go out tomorrow to an area that is.

Here's today's booty. Could have gotten more, but I had a massive allergy attack, and no Benedryl with me.



Guess what's for dinner?

Amy