The Frugal Gourmet

Readers of this blog are aware that I have more than a passing interest in Mushrooms.

Mushroom Knife

BBC Radio 4 has somewhat out of season recently broadcast a couple of interesting short programmes about mushrooms. I thought I would share the links with you, but if you want to listen you may have to be quick.

The first link is to Joy of Ceps a short programme by Alan Bennell of the Royal Botanic Gardens in Edinburgh who succinctly reveals all.

The second is from a regular programme called Open Country the edition from the 20th November 2010 on New Forest Mushrooms gives more detail and a different perspective from The Joy of Ceps. The broadcast has Richard Uridge joins mycologist, John Wright, to hear about his lifelong passion for wild mushrooms and joins him on a forage in the forest to find out how to know what to look for when picking fungi.

It is the popularity of TV chefs and cooking shows that Forestry Commission Keeper, Howard Taylor, thinks has increased the public’s passion for fungi. He joins Richard to explain the importance of the relationship that fungi have with other trees and plants in the forest and the dangers of over-picking the many wild mushrooms that grow there. As well as the obvious dangers of picking poisonous fungi, Howard’s remit as a Keeper is also to protect the landscape of the New Forest and the rise in numbers of wild mushroom pickers may lead to an upsetting of the delicate balance of the Forest.