A Few Tips for the Cook

Mushrooms contain a lot of water, proteins, mineral substances and organic acids, so picked mushrooms are easily attacked by moulds, by the larvae inside them and even by bacteria.

On returning from the forest, you must deal with the mushrooms as quickly as possible, putting all other work aside. They must not be left until the next day, and if there is no other way out or you have not managed to deal with them in time, they must be taken out of the baskets for the night and spread out loosely in a cold, dark cellar or another cool room.

Mushrooms can be dried, salted, pickled or frozen. They are made into juices, chopped mushroom preparations, flour and other semi-finished products.

There is plenty of literature on how to use mushrooms and prepare them for a meal or as supplies for the winter, and many tips in magazines, newspapers and cookery guides. Incidentally, cooks themselves are also well informed, each more inventive than the next; they have their own tried and tested methods and gladly share their experience with others. A few useful tips:

• process fresh mushrooms that have been gathered or bought for food as quickly as possible; • do not wash ceps, orange birch boletes, birch boletes or slippery jacks too much: over time water soaks into them, the mushrooms become watery and soft and lose some of their aroma; • slippery jacks, brittlegills and other mushrooms whose skin peels easily should be peeled, since this removes a considerable part of the bitter and other substances unnecessary for food; • ceps, slippery jacks, orange birch boletes, parasol mushrooms and non-bitter brittlegills can be fried without parboiling or after merely pouring boiling water over them; • clean mushrooms with a stainless steel knife; • soak bitter-tasting brittlegills and milkcaps for several (or a dozen or so) hours, changing the water 1–3 times, then parboil them and pour off the water they were boiled in; • boil and fry them over a low heat in closed enamelled pans for no longer than 20–30 min.; when fried longer, mushrooms become tough, harder to digest and less well absorbed, and their nutritional value declines; • citric acid lightens colour, so it should be used when parboiling orange birch boletes, yellow slippery jacks (makavykai), tamprieji baravykai (firm boletes), yellowfoots, some knights and other mushrooms that darken; • butter, onions and a little garlic improve the aromatic and flavour qualities of mushrooms; • eat prepared mushroom dishes on the same day: in the refrigerator mushroom dishes lose their aromatic qualities, so it is better to keep mushrooms raw and fresh, without parboiling; • all mushrooms are tastier and better absorbed by the body when chopped as finely as possible; • dried mushrooms will not lose their value for several years if you keep them in an airtight, dark container, especially a glass one; • salted and pickled mushrooms should be eaten within a year; • do not buy or sell pickled and salted mushrooms at markets, because poisonous ones may also be acquired there – buy mushrooms only in shops; • mushrooms are frozen at a temperature no higher than -18 °C; only young, firm, non-watery mushrooms are frozen (ceps, slippery jacks, orange birch boletes, chanterelles and some others), cleaned thoroughly and wrapped in a sheet of foil; • fry (stew) mushrooms only in butter, by no means in vegetable oil; frozen mushrooms can be kept for no longer than 3–4 months; • mushrooms are dried at a high (60–70 °C) temperature in a ventilated room; • eating dishes of pickled, salted or otherwise preserved, and even freshly prepared, mushrooms that have been washed uncleanly and not cooked well enough can cause botulism; illness sets in after the meal, most often after 10–24 hours, sometimes even after 2 weeks, through poisoning by the toxins of the anaerobic soil-dwelling bacterium (Clostridium botulinuni) present in the mushroom dish.

Signs of poisoning: the person who has eaten feels nauseous, vomits, sees double, has a headache, and other signs appear similar to those caused by very poisonous mushrooms. Botulism bacteria cannot tolerate acidic (pH 4.3), salty (10 percent salt concentration) and low (4–6 °C) temperature conditions; under such conditions they do not multiply in an anaerobic environment. These bacteria live in humus-rich soil, so when using mushrooms you must in all cases clean them thoroughly and cook them well; • mushrooms gathered by children must be looked through and checked so that no inedible or even poisonous one gets in; • the stems of most mushrooms are woody and are not used for food, except that when dried they are suitable for feeding birds or livestock.