Bolete

The king bolete, or cep, is a monarch indeed, third only to the truffle and morel in the gastronomic hierarchy. It is part of a large family of chubby mushrooms with bulbous stems and fleshy caps (the Italian name for cep is porcini, meaning little pigs). Boletes have a spongy mass of tiny tubes under the cap instead of gills. Their flavor is at once perfumed and pungent, vividly evocative of the hardwood and coniferous woods where they grow. Unless picked young, they easily become soggy.