[pct-l] Fw: Food Dehydrator Tips or Recipes?

[Edward Anderson]

We lived in Mendocino for 34 years and also had a horse ranch in Comptche. We 
moved three years ago to Agua Dulce - my wife had come down with an incurable 
case of "grandsonitis".  She insisted that we move closer to our grandson! I 
like it in Agua Dulce. and it's great that the PCT passes through. We discovered 
it while researching the PCT and meeting the Saufleys.  If you have to live in 
Los A. County this is the best.  But I still miss Mendocino.

MendoRider



________________________________
From: Scott Williams <baidarker at gmail.com>
To: Edward Anderson <mendoridered at yahoo.com>
Cc: pct-l at backcountry.net
Sent: Tue, December 7, 2010 5:35:13 PM
Subject: Re: Fw: [pct-l] Food Dehydrator Tips or Recipes?

You have wonderful foraging up there, and much more varied than the East Bay 
Hills where I cut my teeth with meadow mushrooms in the late 60's.  I make 
several pilgrimages each fall and winter to pick a friends property and 
environs, north of Gualala, just over the border of Mendocino County.  You live 
in one beautiful place.  I also made an ethical decision 40 years ago to stay 
away from the entire amanita family.  There are simply so many really safe 
mushrooms to pick with no look-alikes.    



On Tue, Dec 7, 2010 at 4:31 PM, Edward Anderson <mendoridered at yahoo.com> wrote:


>
>Hey Shroomer, Thanks for your concern. I have been collecting and eating wild 
>mushrooms since shortly after moving to Mendocino in 1973.
>We have a saying up on the North Coast: " There are no old, brave, mushroom 
>hunters". When we first moved there we talked to a Ranger at Russian Gulch State 
>Park who told us of a recent incident in the park when an entire Italian family 
>who were camped in the park died of mushroom poisoning. They thought they were 
>collecting Coccoras but Death Caps were apparently growing amongst them. The 
>delicious mushroom soup that they made in the Park was lethal.   I am very 
>careful when collecting wild mushrooms - and I never collect any Amanitas. There 
>are several species that I am very familiar with and eat whenever I can find 
>them. None of these have poisonous look-alikes. I limit my picking to about 15 
>species. 
>
>
>I would not bring any book on the trail - too heavy and bulky. I only eat what I 
>am sure of. That includes several greens and, of course, onions for my trout 
>stew.
>
>MendoRider  
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>----- Forwarded Message ----
>From: Scott Williams <baidarker at gmail.com>
>
>To: Edward Anderson <mendoridered at yahoo.com>
>Cc: Diane Soini of Santa Barbara Hikes <diane at santabarbarahikes.com>; 
>pct-l at backcountry.net
>Sent: Tue, December 7, 2010 3:26:21 PM
>Subject: Re: [pct-l] Food Dehydrator Tips or Recipes?
>
>
>Great books MendoRider.  Mushrooms Demystified is the Bible for West Coast 
>mushrooms, and David Aurora is a wonderfully funny writer and local member of 
>the Santa Cruz Mycological Society, or at least he was years ago when I was with 
>the San Francisco Mycological Society.  However, it weighs about 5 lbs, and is 
>bigger than most Bibles.  If you're inclined to bring a mushroom book in your 
>pack, especially in WA, bring his field guide, "All that the Rain Promises, and 
>More."  Much lighter, great pix and very funny.  He describes certain mediocre 
>mushrooms as, "Better stomped than chomped, better kicked than picked."  One 
>caveat however, learn mushrooms from a person who knows and not from a field 
>guide, as some look so much alike in pictures, and the descriptions are never 
>like handling them in the field with someone who can show you the differences up 
>close and personal.  The classic in terms of this is the confusion between 
>amanita caliptrata, (the cocoli, or cocorra), and amanita phaloides, (the death 
>cap).  Caliptrata is edible and delicious, but pictures don't get across the 
>differences between it and the death cap, which is a close relative.  When you 
>hear of liver transplants and deaths it is usually the confusion of these two.  
>When shown them side by side in the field, you would wonder how anyone could 
>ever mistake them, but they do.  
>
>
>But wild foods on the trail can so enhance the usual dried fare we live on.  And 
>Steel-Eye, when our mountaineer, Swiss, vegetarian, Smiles was introduced to the 
>wild onions of the Sierra she did an absolute dance on trail, and added them to 
>her lunches and dinners from then on.  They are so delicious, and grow in such 
>profusion over much of the trail.  Also in the desert sections were absolutely 
>delicious lettuces, some very similar to endive.  Eating trout and wild salad 
>greens sounds like a great way to go.
>
>Shroomer
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