Black Chanterelles - Prep / Cooking / Cultivation??

[FDK]

Today I decided my Hunting would focus on Black Chantereeles and I managed to gather about a half pound which are currently sitting in my basket awaiting the finale of their life cycle, But these being the odd looking fungi they are by nature I'm somewhat hesitant to simply do a quick rinse before tossing them into the skillet with some butter and mabey a clove of "wild" Garlic growing near the back of the property here. I'm basicly having difficulty deciding which parts need to be trimmed away and which I should eat.

So beyond just dusting off dirt & grit, cutting out the rim around holes in the sides which I gues might be parasitic in source (??) Or perhaps being as they are such delicate little flora the ovoid "holes" could just be tears caused by their having forced their way up thru a leaf or two?? I also tend to soak my Wilds in a bath of hot salted water in an effort to drive off any lil' critters hiding in the cracks & crevaces.

So far this method has done ok for the other Chanterelle varieties and Bolets, no major impact on flavor or texture. But I just thought I'd ask this wonderful community if they have any favored methods of cleaning and preperation for these odd little forest finds as I'm finding it hard to tell just where the bad spots end and the good stuff begins. The incredible aroma that has me wanting to say Eff it and just chuck them dirt and all into my fryin' pan But I'll be patient.

And at $64 a Dried pound I may just have found the local Wild edible I want to try propegating


And but while on my hunt today I came across a few shelves of Polyporaceae which were young & soft but the top was absolutely black with just a sliver of dark greyish-black running along the outer edge and the underside. Havent been able to find squat on name, edibility, etc. Any ideas folks?

**And I dont think it's a Turkey Tail, unless it's just too young to really tell. Mabey I'll check back in a week or two.

[Workman]

Unfortunately, this is a mycorhizal species and has never been cultivated.

[FDK]

Well while they didn't focus on the Black variety, theres actually been success in cultivating the other Chanterelle varieties, also mycorhizal in nature. Not to say it's an easy task, most effort seems to be directed toward establishing nurseries by starting seedling trees in a sterile environment wherein the Chanterelles get to establish the initial relationship with the tree prior to moving the tree to the outdoor nursery area.

I'm thinking of a twist on the theme, keeping it all indoors and Bonzai'ing the seedlings so as to allow a few trays per rack, just for experiments sake. But they actually have been cultivated. (It's got me curious about the Amanitas now,,, but first things first. )

The really cool thing being that in nature, the Chanterelles take a good number of years to "colonize the substrate" (In nature, a tree wont support them till it's at least 10 years in age) beneath the tree and fully establish their mycorhizal relationship with the host tree whereas while under "un-natural" conditions, without forigen species to compete for the tree's affections, they have found it possible to get Chanterelles to the fruiting stage within a year.

So if anyone's interested after reading the report, I'm sure I could come up with some prints or a fresh sample for those who are in a better position to get started with a grow sooner than I. Chanterelle Cibarius, Cinnabinus and Cranerellus fallax are fairly abundant around here thou most of the fallax are pretty friggin sad looking Id guess as a result of too much forest litter, most staying beneath the layer and getting "infested". Those making it up without the litter in the way are doing pretty well, getting all the Vit D they need I'd guess seems to make them more resilient to the larva, or mabey the Larva just cant take all the direct sun??

But the main emphasis of this thread was my trying to figure out good from bad spots on a Black Chanterelle, kinda hard to see the black spots ya' know.
so if anyones been picking and has some nice shots of acceptable vs. tossers they could share, I'd be most appreciative.


Heres the 90 page PDF report on their study on cultivating Chanterelles, very informative stuff, goes into great detail on the strenghts & weaknesses of the different Varieties as well the means & methods they used to cultivate.
http://www.fs.fed.us/pnw/pubs/gtr576.pdf

[Lazlo]

I could imagine the costs of attempting something like this would be very high. It's not easy to simply isolate pure cultures of a mycorhizal species also. I think I would find a spot in the woods that produces Chanty's and would harvest from there. You're taking on a highly skilled and expensive project if you decide to do so.

[FDK]

Well, I'm turning an empty mobile home into my workspace / grow area. Not specificly for any species but it should be ideal for indoor cultivation on a near commercial scale once I'm done (Money's kinda tight so progress is quite slow now), at least a crop large enough to bring to the local farmers market. Over time, makinge enough to clone the setup in another gutted mobile home,(They're dirt cheap down here, aside from the relocation & rehab costs) expand market, clone again and so on. Not to say it's easy per-se, but If it were, they wouldn't be fetching $64 a pound dried.

It would definatly be insanely pricey if I were having to use contractors, off the shelf air filtration systems and whatnot, but I've got a long history of renovation work, as well as building gadgets, devices & thingamabobs with odds & ends / salvage & surplus. (Primary occupation is Electromechanical Technician, 10 years experience, 3 years at Maintenance Engineer level. Not really a big market for these skills in a 30 mile radius so looking for a "Farm hand" gig now. )

As far as isolating the pure culture, it's not a great deal different than cloning other live species, thou the Black Chanterelle is rather thin skinned and does play host to a number of bacteria so I'd guess using a neomyacin Agar with additional nutes from local tree roots would be more appropriate than simple nutritional agar (Lots of young trees around here die off before making it to the upper canopy so theres ample supply of Shagbark hickory rootstock which the Chanterelles seem to love.) At least this is what the report linked above leads me to believe. So really in essence, according to their findings, once the fairly sterile work environment is acheived it's not too much more complex than adding a seedling tree* to your indoor bulk-sub patch.

*Seedling Tree also cultivated in a similarly sterile area

[karmakraze]

Good luck in your experiment!