If you are desperate and like the smell of herring? - this mushroom is for you - Crab brittlegill

Show desperation in the woods

There is a universal saying that "a drowning man grabs a razor" Strangely enough, it also fits well with mushroom pickers. To get out of the forest with your face, you have to have something in the bin. And here comes another saying - "better saffron milk cap than nothing". Only that the latter saying is very outdated. Today, finding a healthy rust is almost a miracle.

Well, sometimes we are left with collecting niche species, that is, those that children kick with their shoes in the park - Crab brittlegill.

The name of this species comes from its color, as it has a brown color, reminiscent of red wine. But it also has another name that comes from its scent - herring Crab brittlegill.

It is one of the most popular mushrooms in European forests, overlooked, unwanted, disliked by mushroom pickers, but is it right? Not necessarily

Young fruiting bodies are great for marinades, unfortunately the older ones stink of fish and there is no special use for them.

The cap of this mushroom has a blood red, wine red, maroon, purple color, which the closer to the center of the hat is the darker. Its dimensions can reach up to 13 cm in diameter. It has a smooth surface, shiny and slippery after rainfall. The young hat is semicircular, becoming concave with age, often with a large indentation.

The fungus is a lamellar mushroom, so its hymenophore is the lamellae. In young mushrooms they are white, with time creamy, until old age they are ocher, yellow.

The leg is cylindrical, cylindrical, often massive and thick. It can reach up to 10 cm in height. A characteristic feature of the grapevine is a red, guilty coating on the leg, which makes it possible to distinguish this species from other similar mushrooms.

The flesh of young fruiting bodies has a slightly spicy taste and a mushroom smell. In the elderly, the smell is herring, fishy, which disappears after heat treatment.

The fungus is common, it can be found from early spring to late autumn in pine, spruce and mixed forests. It is an edible mushroom, but no exaggeration. If I want the taste and smell of fish, I will buy caviar.