I arrived in Helsinki on Saturday and planned to meet with my friend Natasha on Sunday. Just a day before my arrival she asked me whether I would be interested in a mushroom-picking. to which I replied with an enthusiastic “yes” – it was my first opportunity in thirty years!
The kind of mushrooms we were going to forage presented a little challenge, because they were trumpet chanterelles, which I never picked in my life, and you need a eye for each mushroom specie to be an efficient forager, but eventually I figured it out.
I saw a surprising number of butter mushrooms around (they should have been gone by that time of the year), but since those were the maushrooms I used to go for as a child, I could spot them right away. Unfortunately, all except for one I picked were too old and I ended up throwing them away after they got home, but we cooked what was left :).
There were also some russulas, some too old, but some still healthy and perfectly eatable, and some other mushrooms I was unsure about, possibly white and black milk-caps, but since I was not sure, we prefereed not to experiment. And there were lingonberries – all over the place! I already bought a box in a grocery store, but the ones staight from the stems – they were bigger and sweeter than the ones from the store, and I couldn’t stop munching on them!
Over two hours in the forest. Almost severn pounds of trumpet chanterelles. Breath-taking views. Slightly wet feet. Priceless :).
