Peter Mu does it for friendship. He discovered wild mushrooms while hunting, spearfishing and hiking with friends, and first ate them with friends.
It took him six years to get to where he is now – mushroom-confident, taking big steps through the thickets of Del Monte Forest, making statements such as: “Mushroom is a fruit of the fungi. The actual organism is in the trees; actually, it’s all over the place… Yeah, I can smell them, I just can’t see them. Let’s go west.”
Mu, program minister at Fungus Federation of Santa Cruz, has been picking up various species over the years: morels, oyster mushrooms, chanterelles. “A constant expansion of a culinary domain,” he says, but we are looking for porcinis, as Italians call Boletus edulis. Mu’s Italian friend, whom he’s meeting later in a different part of the forest, is obsessed with them.
Full disclosure: I’m obsessed too. In my native Poland, we call porcinis borowik, “the one of deep forest,” or prawdziwek “the real one.” They are the base of a Christmas Eve mushroom gravy that is part of a pescatarian feast of 12 dishes (see recipe at right). I gave up on the tradition altogether after moving to the U.S., convinced that porcinis and affordable health care are things you only get abroad.
Much to my delight, however, you can find this delicacy locally. I turned to Mu to learn how.
First, consider the habitat, he says. Boletes likes pines, and it turns out Monterey Pines love them back. In other words, Monterey County is wild mushroom heaven; anywhere the pines grow, you can plan a porcini hunt. Make sure you are not on private property and that the collection is not forbidden, Mu suggests.
Second, pay attention to the season.
“They are coming in fall and winter after a couple of first good soaks, which is right now,” Mu says. He likes to hunt for mushrooms in the morning, always carrying a knife to shave off the mushroom while leaving the mycelium beneath in the soil after removing a mushroom from the ground.
Third – know what you are looking for. Ten minutes perusing through Mushrooms of the Redwood Coast: A Comprehensive Guide to the Fungi of Coastal Northern California by Christian Schwarz and Noah Siegel (the book Mu calls the “regional bible”) can give you a head spin, and what is documented is just a small fraction of what is out there. No wonder humans feel uneasy about mushrooms – we can barely understand them. It’s not worth taking risks, so be sure you know what you’re looking at. Take a picture of porcini on your phone or carry the book with you so you can compare what you find in the forest.
Finally, remember to be patient. “Even if you know all the prime spots,” Mu says, “you still have to do the work. Even knowing a good porcini spot doesn’t mean they will be there, you know, aisle 10, ready for you.”