Here´s one characterization: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hp8uZ2Kd5GY
Here´s another: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calvatia_ ... ffball.jpg

Bob

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I'd characterize puffballs as not so good soccer balls. While I have never eaten one, they do pop up on the edge of a small wooded area on the edge of an village park where I walk. One particularly large specimen tempted a young teen to give it a good kick to minimal effect. I don't remember what happened to his shoes, but he had a particularly confused look on his face.

And I sometimes wonder if the allure of the morel has much to do with the nature of the hunt. I've had a few and they were fine. But I remember being more excited about finding them than eating them. The search and the stalking of one's food all in the name of a morning's hike...

I had a large pile of rotting oak in my backyard, under a number of standing maple trees. I did naively try to shake out some spores of a morel before it was cooked to see if I could recreate the forest on a small scale, but it was a no go.

C'mon, I know what they look like; how do they taste? Those hipsters weren't much help with "kinda mushroomy", either, then adding it to a curried veggie ragout and declaring it to be "kind of like a flavorless marshmallow". I won't be going to those two again if I'm looking for epicurean reviews.

I only saw much in the way of puffballs when I was a kid, and they were all of the small variety; none ever got nearly as big as the ones that seem to get all the press. When they went brown and papery we'd squirt the spores at each other.


For me a sauteed morel tastes like fried walleye, which isn't a bad thing in itself, but it can be off-putting if what you're used to is button mushrooms. No doubt it's why it sometimes gets called "dry land fish".

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I don't think I've ever had either a morel or walleye. In fact, I had to look up walleye. It's not a word, or a fish, I'm familiar with. I also don't remember ever coming across morels in the wild, although apparently they are around in the UK if you know where to look.

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Probably my favorite mushroom to eat would be the Augustus Agaricus. This is a ´shroom which has a remarkable aroma and flavor of Amaretto. It is quite large. I once found a solitary specimen 18 inches tall and over 7 inches across. I was able, with difficulty, to cultivate one particular strain of them collected from around Bakersfield,CA. They like it Hot. To initiate a fruiting takes several days around 100 degrees fahrenheit. I agree that puffballs can be rather bland, but since they are a relative to the Augustus, I wonder how they might be sauteed in butter with a dash of Amaretto.
I like my morels quite simple. Sauteed in butter with flour, or cornmeal. I find them savory, and use them, When I can get them!, as an addition to sauces.
I once had access to a, I guess you´d call it a compost pile, of several tons of lawn clippings. An acquaintence had a lawn, more like a driving range of several hundred yards down to a small lake. He threw the clippings down a sidehill. Every summer this area had the most remarkable fruiting of Lepiota Rachodes, Shaggy Parasols. I could collect bushels at a time once a week for several weeks each summer. They have a faint aroma of Burgundy, and this inspired a chef friend to serve them in a reduced Burgundy Sauce. Í had many companions who mourned when I could no longer collect these ´shrooms. They do, unfortunately have a close resemblance to the Amanita Pantherina, poisonous, so you do want to be sure of your identification.
Which brings up the unfortunate immigrants from SE Asia who mistake the Amanita Phalloides, Death Cap, for the delicious Paddy Straw ´shrooms so ubiquitous in ´the old country´.
One year we had a huge bloom of Matsutake. An acquaintance gave me a bushel basket full. We ate them until I was sick of ´em. Not my favorite. But they have an elusive aroma reminiscent of the candy ´Red Hots´.
As a cultivator, my mainstays were the Shii-take, The Lion´s Mane, and the Agrocybe Aegerita-the Black Poplar Mushroom called ´Il Pioppino´ by the Sicilians. We tried Nameko, but my buddy was much more successful with those as he used log-culture.

Bob

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I had a good friend who actually hired a bunch of guys to go through the woods in rural central Virginia gathering morels, which he sold to local restaurants. Every so often he'd get enough that he'd invite a bunch of us for dinner. That's when I fell in love with morels. The two dishes that really stood out for me were a pate and fettuccini alfredo. I can usually score a few in my yard -- they pop up in mulch. I just saute them in a little butter, and it's a minute of heaven for the wife and me.

They've never reminded me of fish.

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I bought a couple morels once just for my wife to taste. Raw, she said "meh, they just taste like mushrooms" but sauteed in some buttet with a pinch of salt, and her eyes rolled up and she goes "oh yeah, now I know what all the fuss is about." They didn't taste like fish to me either.

Growing my own shiitake, I was surprised at how strong the smell was. From that cake I linked above, I cut one mushroom, put it in a baggie, and took it to work to let people taste what a fresh just-picked-30-minutes-ago shiitake tasted like. When I opened the baggie, you could smell that one mushroom on the entire floor of the office.

One of my favorite mushrooms to cook is lobster mushroom (Hypomyces lactifluorum), which I guess isn't even really a mushroom. It was really fun to cook with.

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My favourite is sulphur polypore (aka Chicken of the woods) - lovely flavour fried for breakfast. Before I was a vegetarian I thought it went well with bacon & fried bread.

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The walleye is very closely related to what you might know as a zander or pike-perch. It's sometimes erroneously called "walleyed pike", but it's actually not a pike at all. It's the Minnesota state fish, and a traditional dish of choice hereabouts. It's so prized that we have to manage stocks lest it be overfished. They can get to almost three feet long and 20 lbs - and even bigger yet - but 14" to 18" is considered prime eating size. Sport fishers like it too, because it's a real fighter.


Hmm. Maybe it's one of those things like cilantro, then.

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Ah. Coriander, eh?

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Exactly.

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Lovely stuff. On the other hand, coriander ... no, actually, I like that, too.

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Sometimes I wonder how you guys can tell your arses from a hole in the ground ...

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There's a difference?

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It's too early in my day for ontological philosophy.

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