A fungal adventure between Bondone and Storo

Our tea maker and alarm clock woke us up at 6:30 am this morning. This unusually early hour was not a mistake as our friends Raffaella and Lorenzo were to arrive at 8:00 am so that we could go for a stroll between two of our local towns. At first sight this might appear to be to be rather commonplace, except that Bondone is half way up a significant hill and there is no road from Bondone to Storo, just a mountain path.

Every time we climb up here I try to remember the names of the peaks when they are described to me, total failure so far.

We have strolled to the refuge at Alpo quite a few times, once in deep snow, although I need to confess that we didn’t make it that time. We arrived at Alpo by a different route today and the place looked very different to previous visits, just because of path change.

There is a mountain path from Alpo to Lago di Garda, which we might have a crack at next year, if we are here.

Going for a stroll in the mountains with an Italian family is a real treat. A treat not only for good company but also to learn about the plants, animals and geology of the area. We would be in deep conversation about something when someone would spot an interesting plant, some leaves or, more importantly, an edible fungus. At that point conversation ceased as something really important had to be done.

I am tempted to say that the magnificent fungus in the photo above is called Lorenzo. In truth it is an enormous porcini, tomorrow’s supper.

All of this diving into the undergrowth for fungi started to fill me with a feeling of inadequacy and I could feel the need to dive into the undergrowth as well. My ignorance of the edible varieties made me feel diffident about making a collection as I wanted to wake up tomorrow morning at home not in casualty or the mortuary.

Little by little with lots of encouragement from my chums, I started to be able to distinguish “Lactarius deliciosus” and, after a few successful identifications, started to collect these delightful blighters. This fungus has a peculiarity which helps even the newest fungus collector to be successful, the thing leaves yellow stain on one’s fingers. Janet joined in and we soon had gathered enough for a trial run at least.

We arrived home after a beer and I cleaned the fungi and bunged them in the frying pan with some salt and olive oil. Instructions were to let them cook for between 20 to 30 minutes. As the mushrooms were cooking the juice became redder and redder and the huge pan full of fungi shrank down to manageable proportions

We ate our fungi, washed down with some home brew, which I thought had failed but is actually quite tasty. The fungi were delicious with a very particular taste. What a way to finish a fabulous day.

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