October 15 “He may have been a fungi, but he sure did have questionable morels.”

October 15th is White Cane Safety Day. In our local museum in Peoria, we have a cane that now is representitive of the official white and red colored cane for the blind. It was the first one, and is on display as you walk into the museum.

October 15th is also National Mushroom Day. Who doesn’t have a book or two on Mushrooms? First I have “Field Book of Common Mushrooms” by William S. Thomas, published 1948. While there are some poisonous mushrooms out there, this would help those who like mushrooms (I am not in that crowd) a better chance of only picking and eating safe ones, including the evasive Morel.

Once you find mushrooms to eat, how do you cook them? I have “Mushroom Cookery” by Helmut Ripperger, published 1941. I also have other Ripperger-authored cookbooks, including ones for Cheese, Coffee, and Spice Cookery.

The Author tells us to use fresh mushrooms, but not to forget about canned mushrooms. I personally think that is the waste of a perfectly good can, but others disagree with me. Several recipes in the book are: ‘To dress a dish of fungie’ (butter, cream, paprika, pepper); or ‘Couquilles Maison’ (mushrooms and crab); or ‘mushroom jelly’; or ‘Rognoni al marsala con funghi’ (mushrooms and calve’s kidney); ‘pickled mushroom’; ‘mushroom fritters’; ‘stewed pigeons and mushrooms’; and about fifty more recipes that I don’t have the shroom to write about.

While I collect cookbooks, I do not collect any mushroom recipes to cook later. I do try mushrooms on a pizza every couple of years, just to see if I still hate them. Last week, I took my wife out to a dive bar that makes really good pizzas. I tried their special, which had mushrooms on it, just to re-test my palate. The pizza was good but after several bites, I started picking the mushrooms off.

The waitress ran over, and said “I couldn’t help but notice your face, trying to eat those mushrooms. You could have ordered without.” My wife and I laughed. I said “I was just testing the ‘ol taste buds, and they’re working just fine.”

Then I told her, “I think I ate too many mushrooms for dinner. Now I don’t have mushroom for dessert…” She responded, “?”

Thanks for reading, I morel less can do without mushrooms.