Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Fungi delights

We’re due to head back to Ireland in the next few days – and all very hectic trying to finish everything off – next time we return it will be harvest time in mid-October.

Aside from the grapes looking pretty good at this stage, lots of other things (very frustratingly) are just reaching optimum ripeness. We’ve already had plenty of blackberries and now plums, pears and peaches are all over the place – literally falling off the trees all around us.

The other really special wild treasure are mushrooms in the forest – all shapes and sizes. About 60% of Slovenia is covered by trees, so mushroom hunting is very much a local pastime - and speciality. Truffles are also apparently around, but hunting for them is forbidden so they don’t really feature in the local cuisine.

However there are a multitude of fungi of all shapes and sizes. I only wish we knew more about them – something to read about over the Winter. Many of them look vaguely familiar – but not familiar enough to try!

I did however find something I have never seem before – a mushroom that looks like it would be more at home it the sea as a red starfish! Picture quality isn't great as it was taken with a phone camera in a dark forest. I have no idea what it is – any ideas?

3 comments:

  1. Liam, I hope you have a good guide book.

    http://news.scotsman.com/health/We-all-fell-sick-and.6514103.jp

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  2. Yikes! Luckily the red thing looked so vile we chickened out of even touching it. But it was definitely a mushroom. We have friends here in Westport who have become mushroom hunters over the Summer, but no sign of the "red starfish" variety yet......

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  3. Greetings from Galicia, Spain. I saw one of those the other day by a stream. The other day I saw one of those by a stream. It is called "Clathrus Archeri" or "Octopus stinkhorn" in common English. Apparently is of Australian origin... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clathrus_archeri

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