Coast Range Chanterelles

fortywinks · 10-06-2007, 05:59 PM

It's what's for dinner!

Not abundant by any means, but well worth the effort if you are willing to hunt them. The last 10 days of rain has them popping. Wife and I collected about two 5 gallon buckets yesterday afternoon and this morning. We have no honey holes, so we just started looking in likely areas under timber with lots of needles, moss, and rotting stumps and blowdown. They are gems in the rough.

After we boiled off the water we sauteed with butter, dry sherry, fresh garlic, and sweet onions. To die for...

We have found that they do not lose their flavor or edibility if you cook them and then freeze them for future use.

kingtroller · 10-06-2007, 10:32 PM

Nice haul!

I went out today and picked enough for dinner... beef stroganoff with chanterelles. Top notch table fare.

I noticed they were tougher to find, but 95% of them were in perfect condition. Well worth the effort.

Keep smiling,

kingtroller

mrprincedog · 10-07-2007, 02:19 AM

Those look awesome. Can you explain what 'boiling off the water' means, and how and why.

Thanks

fortywinks · 10-07-2007, 04:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mrprincedog

Those look awesome. Can you explain what 'boiling off the water' means, and how and why.

Thanks

They require quite a bit of cleaning and washing and they absorb a good deal of water in the process, so it is recommended to 'dry satuee" them before adding seasoning other than salt (which helps the process), so you need to boil off the excess liquid or pour it off.

If you are interested in more info you might refer to David Arora's book "All That the Rain Promises and More..."

Joe Schwab · 10-07-2007, 04:23 PM

They are out everywhere. Even in the ditches along the road! My wife has a food dryer and dries them and stores them in a jar. I think they are even better when reconstituted. They last all year that way also.

I'm going out again this week.

letsfish · 10-07-2007, 07:02 PM

Wow! That is excellent ! I found a few but found a lot that were molding on the edges- I figure those were ones that got a jump on things and then dried up(edges first) and then took off with the rain only to have the edges go moldy.