Found it!

Found it! We found Chicken of the Woods, a delightful culinary edible, coveted by chefs worldwide for bouillon de champignons.

I find it humorous that we've been hiking God's green earth all these months, only to find it conveniently in our backyard, on the way to the mailbox.

We landed a one pound specimen, fairly young, and discovered it currently sells for about 25$ a lb. Whoa! We dehydrated it at 135 degrees for ten hours then powdered it down to two cups of bouillon. Store in an air tight mason jar with a desiccant packet for best results. I just reuse the silica packet from inside one of our favorite snacks here.

We added it to frittata, creamy pasta sauce, and ramen for an excellent thickener with a buttery chicken flavor.

We made sure to boil the bouillon particles for about two minutes to ensure they are fully cooked. We initially ingested a tiny amount to test any unknown reactions. Later on, we combined it with bread crumbs in eggplant parmesan topping as a parmesan cheese replacement. Perfect.

Worthy of note. Our specimen was from an Oak tree and not a Beech or Cherry tree. We had a mushroom expert explain how specimens from these trees could pick up oils from their source and upset the stomach. So be careful of that. Strategies to safely identify edible mushrooms? Here's a previous blog and a great video here.

Mushroom hunting has been fun! We've discovered such exotic specimens.

Meadow puffball (edible), Lavender Meadow Cort (Not Edible), Creamy Russula (No thank you.)

One mushroom was hilarious looking, the giant Puffball Mushroom, which can grow larger than a soccer ball.

It's completely edible, similar in taste to white button mushrooms. If you search you tube for recipes, it's hilarious what people do with this monstrosity. Cook it like steak on the grill, use it in place of tofu, etc.... It was delicious sautéed with onion, garlic and spices. Our finds were only the size of golf balls, resembling mozzarella cheese balls when sliced through.

Some of our finds were deadly if consumed, but looked completely harmless...just a little brown mushroom, right? NO, instant death! Hubby found the innocent looking Destroying Angel on our hike one day...I shudder!

We use National Audubon's Mushroom Guide, an online forum of mushroom scientists, and the app "Picture Mushroom".

picturemushroom.com. is a really cool online mushroom encyclopedia that you use with your smart phone.

Happy hunting, friends!

Disclaimer: This blog does not advocate eating wild mushrooms. Please do so at your own discretion through authenticating your mushrooms from three or more verified sources.