Every now and again my friends and I venture into the wild in search of edible goodness. This Sunday our foraging expedition had us traipsing the woods looking for mushrooms and we were not disappointed!

Living in the city has many advantages, but the nature lover in me always jumps at any opportunity to enjoy the outdoors. It might have been a bit chilly and it might have been a bit damp, but there was definitely also something magical about the way we made our way across a floor of soft, deep green moss, hopping from one  fairy ring to another. Not all of these fungi were edible, though. These blue beauties on the left, for example, are a joy to look at, but definitely not something you’d want to put in your mouth!

On the left you can see the edible boletales or bolete mushroom. While they can also be used to make a lovely soup, we used them to make mushroom polenta. The middle and right photo show two large groups of armillaria solidipes also known as honey mushrooms. We simply fried them in a little butter and they were beautifully sweet and juicy.

If you know what you’re doing, foraging is a great way to source unusual and free ingredients. If you don’t know what you’re doing, you might end up getting very ill or even dead, so always make sure to do some extensive reading beforehand to avoid eating poisonous or inedible things.