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Fungi
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By Paul Gayler
Published 1999
Fungi such as wild mushrooms and truffles are some of the strangest yet most delicious foods available to us. These beautiful, aromatic plants feed off living or decaying organic matter by sending a huge web of tiny filaments (mycelium) underground through which they draw in nutrients. Their unpredictable growing habits mean that most of them are impossible to cultivate, hence their sometimes astronomical price and varying availability.
There are hundreds of edible species of fungi (and many more poisonous ones) but only a handful are highly sought after: the exquisite apricot-coloured chanterelle; the dramatically dark trompette de mort – less scarily known as the horn of plenty; the sweet, nutty Boletus edulis, called cep in France and porcini in Italy; and, perhaps most precious of all, the morel – shaped like a date, with a distinctive honeycombed surface and a rich, powerful flavour.