It’s wild mushroom season, and I have a simple but delicious recipe to celebrate the forest’s bounty. But first, a confession.
Whenever I find myself in possession of wild mushrooms, I always feel a certain amount dread coupled with the tingling excitement at this regal woodland gift. Dread may seem like a peculiar emotion to feel in such circumstances, especially given my near-obsessive love of fungi, but perhaps it should be viewed in light of this predilection. Fresh wild mushrooms are unique ingredients in my mind not only because the high price they fetch, but because even an unlimited food budget can only bring them to your plate at certain times of the year, in certain circumstances. When I open that paper bag and breathe in the scent of the forest floor, I am perfectly cognizant of the fact that this may be my only chance to transform these capped beauties into a dish worthy of their fragrance.
My desire to create beautiful and memorable sensory experiences in the kitchen is intensified by the exclusivity of the opportunity. I probably won’t get a second chance. At least not until next year.
I was therefore openly pleased, and covertly apprehensive, when my friend handed me a container of hedgehog mushrooms, and beckoned me to nibble off a corner and experience its earthy, peppery taste. “Oh!” I exclaimed, delighted, letting the sensation take over my palate. I admitted to him that I hadn’t even known that hedgehog mushrooms were a thing. Luckily, my friend also had a plan for how I should use his gift. It involved pine nuts, rosemary and pancetta, the Italian version of bacon. He had read about this preparation in a book, “and apparently it was the best dish he’d ever had!” he said, supposedly referring to the author of the book.
It wasn’t an imperative, but I gladly took it as such. The mushrooms were on the verge of losing their freshness, and so I would have little time to do any research or to let my imagination perform its idea-generating cartwheels. Simple was good. I had pine nuts in my pantry and ample amounts of rosemary in my garden. I could easily stop at the local salumeria on my way home. I told my friend I would put his idea to the test, and let him know how it went.
Even so, back at my cutting board, my culinary skills seemed suddenly all too inadequate. Mushrooms are very forgiving ingredients. They can sustain a lot of injury in the kitchen and still taste delicious, and yet I found myself looking at my frying pan as if I’d never used it before, fiddling unnecessarily with my mise-en-place.
I fretted for nothing of course; the dish was an impressive success: the bouquet of nutty, earthy aromas, bolstered by pork fat, the crispy slices of pancetta, the perfectly browned mushrooms, brightened by a sprinkling of lemon peel, salt crystals and delicate cornflowers. The dish sizzled with the taste of the woods, and my faith in my cast iron pan (and in my cooking skills!) was restored.
About the Ingredients
I used hedgehog mushrooms and chanterelles for this recipe, related species with similar flavour profiles, but feel free to use just one or the other, or to substitute any mushroom you can get, wild or farmed. Chanterelles are more prized (and therefore pricier), but they are also more widely available at markets and grocery stores. The great thing about pancetta is that it goes well with pretty much anything.
Hedgehog Mushrooms (Hydnum repandum)
From Edmund Michael’s 1896 book, Führer für Pilzfreunde (Guide for Friends of Mushrooms)
Instead of gills (like your common button mushroom) or pores (like porcini mushrooms), hedgehog mushrooms have teeth (also called spines) jutting out from below their caps, as if sheltering a sleeping hedgehog. Of course, this means that were you to type its name into Google Images, you would happen upon a lot of cute illustrations of cartoon hedgehogs posing in idyllic woodlands with their fungi friends. In French, the vernacular names for this toothed mushroom get even more imaginative, from pied-de-mouton (sheep’s foot), langue-de-chat (cat’s tongue), barbe-de-vache (cow’s beard), and barbe-de-chèvre (goat’s beard).
Hedgehog mushrooms are available from late-summer to mid-fall. They have an earthy, sweet and peppery taste, but can grow bitter as they age. They are good sautéed, fried and dried.
Chanterelles (Cantharellus cibarius)
From Edmund Michael’s 1896 book, Führer für Pilzfreunde (Guide for Friends of Mushrooms)
Chanterelles, a favourite among chefs and foodies, are prized for their buttery, fruity and slightly peppery flavour and their beautiful golden colour. In the Pacific Northwest, they are in season from late summer to early winter. They do not have gills either, but instead, forking folds called ridges, that run down the stem of the mushroom.
They have a characteristic fruity fragrance, reminiscent, some say, of the apricots whose colour they closely match. They are great sauteed. Their texture becomes unpleasantly tough when dried and reconstituted, so dried chanterelles are best ground to a powder and used to flavour dishes.
Joëlle
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Ingredients
- 500g chanterelles and/or hedgehog mushrooms
- 150g pancetta, sliced into little strips
- 2 tbsp pine nuts
- 2 tsp chopped fresh rosemary
- 1 tsp chopped fresh rosemary
- Maldon sea salt, to taste
- Minced lemon peel (optional)
- Cornflower petals (optional)
Instructions
- Pan-fry pancetta over medium heat. Have a small bowl ready to pour out the excess fat as it accumulates in the pan. When the pancetta is crispy, set them aside, and return your skillet to the heat.
- Add rosemary and stir until it starts to brown.
- Add mushrooms and sauté over medium heat. Pour out any excess liquid into the little bowl from step 1.
- When the mushrooms are almost done, add the pine nuts, and stir until they are golden brown.
- Add the pancetta back into the pan and cook a minute more.
- Remove from heat, and serve, garnished with fresh rosemary, Maldon sea salt, minced lemon peel (optional) and cornflower petals (optional).
- You can pour the reserved liquid back onto the mushrooms, or use it to flavour a broth or a warm vegetable dish.
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References
Michael, E. (1896). Führer für Pilzfreunde: die am häufigsten vorkommenden essbaren, verdächtigen und giftigen Pilze. Mit 68 Pilzgruppen. Zwickau: Förster et Borries.
Spahr, D. L. (2009). Edible and medicinal mushrooms of New England and Eastern Canada. Berkeley, CA: North Atlantic Books.
