"A tale of diversity within our damaged landscapes, The Mushroom at the End of the World follows one of the strangest commodity chains of our times to explore the unexpected corners of capitalism. Here, we witness the varied and peculiar worlds of matsutake commerce: the worlds of Japanese gourmets, capitalist traders, Hmong jungle fighters, industrial forests, Yi Chinese goat herders, Finnish nature guides, and more. These companions also lead us into fungal ecologies and forest histories to better understand the promise of cohabitation in a time of massive human destruction."--Publisher's description.
The ultimate mushroom authority, The Mushroom Book is filled with exquisite photographs of prized culinary fungi--and notorious poisonous specimens. Offering unrivaled insight into the amazing world of mushrooms, this book will prove to be an indispensable reference.
Mushrooms are exciting to find, beautiful to look at, fascinating to identify, and delicious to eat. When you know what to look for, a mushroom hunt is as safe and enjoyable as a treasure hunt. Katya Arnold ranges through the world to find hundreds of varieties of mushrooms, as well as fascinating anecdotes and fun facts that make these wonders of nature exciting and immediate. A walk in the woods will never be the same!
Join Elise Gravel as she explores the science of some of nature's weirdest and wildest characters—mushrooms! Elise Gravel is back with a whimsical look at one of her family’s most beloved pastimes: mushroom hunting! Combining her love of getting out into nature with her talent for anthropomorphizing everything, Gravel takes us on a magical tour of the forest floor and examines a handful of her favorite alien specimens up close. While the beautiful coral mushroom looks like it belongs under the sea, the peculiar lactarius indigo may be better suited for outer space! From the fun-to-stomp puffballs to the prince of the stinkers—the stinkhorn mushroom—and the musically inclined chanterelles, Gravel shares her knowledge of this fascinating kingdom by bringing each species to life in full felt-tip marker glory. Governor General award winning author Elise Gravel’s first book with Drawn & Quarterly, If Found...Please Return to Elise Gravel, was a Junior Library Guild selection, and instant hit among librarians, parents, and kids alike. Fostering the same spirit of creativity and curiosity, The Mushroom Fan Club promises to inspire kids to look more closely at the world around them and seek out all of life’s little treasures, stinky or not!
“A beautifully written portrait of the people who collect and distribute wild mushrooms . . . food and nature writing at its finest.”—Eugenia Bone, author of Mycophilia “A rollicking narrative . . . Cook [delivers] vivid and cinematic scenes on every page.”—The Wall Street Journal In the dark corners of America’s forests grow culinary treasures. Chefs pay top dollar to showcase these elusive and enchanting ingredients on their menus. Whether dressing up a filet mignon with smoky morels or shaving luxurious white truffles over pasta, the most elegant restaurants across the country now feature one of nature’s last truly wild foods: the uncultivated, uncontrollable mushroom. The mushroom hunters, by contrast, are a rough lot. They live in the wilderness and move with the seasons. Motivated by Gold Rush desires, they haul improbable quantities of fungi from the woods for cash. Langdon Cook embeds himself in this shadowy subculture, reporting from both rural fringes and big-city eateries with the flair of a novelist, uncovering along the way what might be the last gasp of frontier-style capitalism. Meet Doug, an ex-logger and crabber—now an itinerant mushroom picker trying to pay his bills and stay out of trouble; Jeremy, a former cook turned wild-food entrepreneur, crisscrossing the continent to build a business amid cutthroat competition; their friend Matt, an up-and-coming chef whose kitchen alchemy is turning heads; and the woman who inspires them all. Rich with the science and lore of edible fungi—from seductive chanterelles to exotic porcini—The Mushroom Hunters is equal parts gonzo travelogue and culinary history lesson, a fast-paced, character-driven tour through a world that is by turns secretive, dangerous, and quintessentially American.
This revised and expanded edition of mushroom expert Bill Russell’s popular Field Guide to Wild Mushrooms of Pennsylvania and the Mid-Atlantic provides both novice and experienced mushroom foragers with detailed, easy-to-use information about more than one hundred species of these fungi, including twenty-five varieties not found in the previous guide. From the Morel to the Chanterelle to the aptly named Chicken of the Woods, mushrooms of the mid-Atlantic region can be harvested and enjoyed, if you know where to look. Each entry in this field guide contains a detailed description, current scientific classification, key updates and information from recent studies, and high-quality color photographs to aid in identification. Thoughtfully organized by season, the guide shows you how to locate and identify the most common mushrooms in the region and recognize look-alikes—and explains what to do with edible mushrooms once you’ve found them. Featuring over one hundred full-color illustrations and distilling Russell’s fifty years of experience in hunting, studying, and teaching about wild mushrooms, Field Guide to Wild Mushrooms of Pennsylvania and the Mid-Atlantic is an indispensable reference for curious hikers, amateur biologists, adventurous chefs, and mycophiles of all stripes.
A new approach to identifying mushrooms based on five key features that can be observed while in the field. Toadstools, truffles, boletes and morels, witches' butter, conks, corals, puffballs and earthstars: mushrooms are both mysterious and ecologically essential. They can also be either delicious or deadly. Thousands of different species of mushrooms appear across North America in the woods, backyards, and in unexpected corners. Learning to distinguish them is a rewarding challenge for a naturalist or chef. Covering most of the common edible and poisonous species readers are likely to encounter, this portable-sized field guide takes a new, simple approach to the method of mushroom identification based on key features that do not require a microscope or technical vocabulary. In addition to the watercolors from the original edition, hundreds more illustrations have been added. These paintings make use of the limited space available in a field guide and focus on the distinguishing details of each species, thereby serving as an ideal tool for beginner and intermediate mycologists alike.
