Dear Valentines , Wild Things.

' We proudly use goods from our ‘Wild Food Larder’ with Local Produce',
This year at work we are in the fortunate position to have a few goodies stored up for a special occasion and what could be a better time to break into the stores selecting some of our favourite wild things and  using them with  local produce than  St Valentines Day. It also happens to be 'Eat local and Irish Week' so we're on the ball with this one. Luckily there are a few greens out there to forage and we are glad to to be able to use those and able to pick some fresh garlic from our container garden to add a touch of Spring to the menu.


VALENTINES DAY DINNER MENU 2013

Crisp Free-range Chicken with Pickled Leek & Chestnut Terrine, Elderberry Dressing

‘Clogher Head’ Crabmeat & Cheddar Croquette,Smoked Seaweed Salad, Red Pepper Salsa

‘Fivemiletown Creamery’ Goat’s Cheese, Sweet Potato Purée, Wood Sorrel, Truffled Honey   Dressing

Baby Leaf Salad ,Cherry Tomatoes, Olives, Buttermilk Croutons & a Basil Pesto

Cauliflower Soup, Curried cream with Coriander
.......
Pan-fried Dry-aged 8oz Irish Rump Steak, Foie Gras Butter, Caramelised Onion Purée

Breast of Mallard ,Celeriac Powder, Sloe Jus & Rowanberry Jelly

Roast Fillet of Pork ,Wild Irish Mushroom Cream Sauce

‘Kilmore Quay’ Scallops,Brooks ‘Urban Garden’ Garlic Butter Sauce, Sea Beet, Colcannon & Crisp Bacon

Roasted Pumpkin ,Feta Cheese Fritters, Sweet Pickled Lemon & Watercress
 ........
Selection of fresh market vegetables and North county Dublin Potatoes.
........
‘Fraughan’s’ Wild Blueberries and Lemon Curd Served with Sugared Shortbread

Elderflower Panacotta ‘Granny Smith’ Apple Foam, Elderflower Caramel & White Chocolate Crumb

Warm ‘Champagne’ Rhubarb, Honeycomb Nougatine Parfait, Ginger Snap Crumble

Irish Farmhouse Cheeses & Water Biscuits
.........
34.95 pp

Bay bolete, Xerocomus badius

A personnel favourite, and would put it up there with the cep, the taste is great but the main reason I favour it is that it suffers much much less from larvae infestation and slug attacks, the squirrels have a taste for it though so there will be a few bite marks about.

What to observe.

the cap.chestnut brown and smooth,suede like when young, grows up to 10-12cm

the tubes. off white,yellow to green with age.

the stem. pale brown-reddish,thin often curved at the base and can be quite long.

the flesh. whitish flesh turning slightly blue when cut.

the taste/smell. mushroomy,nutty.

the habitat.coniferous spruce and pine forest.

A young Baybolete,with soft cap.

Note; the cap has actually exploded of this one, after a spell of

dry weather, followed by heavy rain the soakage of water

causes the stems of some bolete (which are quite tough) to split where they meet the cap, popping it off.

One with an elongated stem

having grown through moss.

Phallus impudicus, Stinkhorn

Most often you'll smell these before you see them, they grow in all types of woodland settings and where you have them they'll be in abundance. They are edible ( tasted mossy) but only in the first stage of growth once they start to mature stay clear.They start out like an egg covered in a mucus and membrane before developing to their phallic state, there are a couple of varieties,including the Dictyophora duplicata ( Netted Stinkhorn) though restricted to the Southern Hemisphere with a net like veil below the cap and the Mutinus caninus (Dog Stinkhorn) pinkcapped.

Enough said the pictures will do.

the edible stage, to eat clean off the membrane and the gel like mucus, slice and pan fry

starting to mature, no smell yet

mature, at this stage they start to stink and attract the flies

past it's personnel best,

though a good time to observe it's honeycomb structure

Chanterelles, A Gold Rush in the Woods

Chanterelles, A Gold Rush in the Woods

Gold Rush, A vien of Chanterelles or 'Kurka!'
 as my Polish friend Tom exclaimed with delight on seeing them.

June is departing and my thoughts are turning to the woods and areas where Chanterelles faithfully return that is unless some other forager has trespassed into the little patches of territory in Dublin’s hinterland that I have staked out in my mind as being mine, and term as my spots, every mushroom hunter does the same. Many good hours spent in my early days trekking through woods and forest off the beaten path in search of veins of the golden morsels makes one feel secretive and protective of their location. After a while in the woods you develop the sense of  knowing whether or not an area has been passed through of late or ever by another forager, if never seems to be the answer, automatically you thinks it's yours and stake it in your mind as such. Of course there are areas where one knows that can’t be claimed and that  ‘the first come first served’ rule applies in your mind. 

Chanterelle. Cantharellus cibarius, Girolles, Pfifferlinge, Kurka.
What to observe. 
Cap. Convex funnelling wavy margin deep yellow. ( tankard/cuplike in mature specimens)
Gills. Forked ridges rather than gills merging into the cap.
Spores. pale yellow / white
Flesh.  yellow into white, tough. 
Stem. Deep yellow short with veins emerging into the cap. 

Smell. Apricot, peppery taste
Habitat. Acid soils mossy river banks coniferous forest and with beech.

Tasting notes.
There's very little Chanterelles don't go with, sautéed on their own and added to scrambled eggs, in cream sauce with Chicken, with a pasta dish or simply served with Turbot,the two meaty textures standing up well together, like I had them one evening in a small restaurant in Baden-Baden , Germany dining with my son Isaac who's now currently on a well deserved post Leaving Inter-rail trip, hopefully he'll capture some good market stall images for future post as he winds his way through Europe.I like the German descriptive name Pfifferlinge, denoting a peppery note to the usual apricot references.

Nb. as with everything cross reference before going picking! beware of confusing with the False Chanterelle Hygrophororopis aurantiaca or in more central and south European areas Omphalotus olearius.

Last season after coming out of woods on that hadn't yielded much, I saw couple of cars just parked behind mine, not unusual for the area,the occupants were still getting themselves together and seemed to be conducting an interview with one of the group,  I naturally viewed them with suspicion, were they hill-walkers, tourist or competition? This is how it went down.

Foraging for wild mushrooms in west Wicklow       DV8 click on link

Wild foods and mushrooms from Dublin

Some photos of stuff i've foraged lately and will give some recipes in later bloggs. I also tweet quick tips
@Pat12cook