Mushroomers take their pick after wet summer

THE soggy summer has a silver lining. This year’s miserable weather has produced a bumper crop of wild mushrooms in Scotland’s woodlands.

Duncan Riley, of Strathspey Mushrooms, supplies wild mushrooms to top restaurants including Michelin-starred The Kitchin and Restaurant Martin Wishart in Edinburgh, and Le Chardon D’Or in Glasgow. He said during August, he was foraging 1,500kg of chantrelle mushrooms per week.

He said: “Normally we would be doing about 1,000kg per week, that’s what we did last year. But this summer has been exceptional, particularly for chantrelles.

“It’s purely down to the lovely Scottish weather. When you have the typical Scottish summer, wet, lots of rain, and a bit of sun, it’s really good for the mushrooms.”

Dozens of species of edible wild mushrooms grow in Scotland’s woodland although only a few, such as chantrelles, ceps, morels and ‘hedgehogs’, are commonly eaten.

Foraging for mushrooms has become more popular in recent years after being advocated by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and Jamie Oliver.

Jeff Bland is Michelin-starred chef at No 1 Restaurant at the Balmoral Hotel in Edinburgh, which is running a foraging outing for guests later this month. He said that it was becoming a more popular pursuit.

“There are more people out foraging now, it’s becoming a more fashionable thing to do. The great thing is that this season, because there are so many of them, there are plenty for everyone.

“People may have to walk a bit further, the ones near car parks and roads tend to go quite quickly, but there are so many out there. And the great thing about mushrooms is if you find them one year, they’ll be growing in the same place the following year.”

Bland said he uses wild mushrooms for a number of dishes in his kitchen, and is using a lot of hedgehog mushrooms this year, after his wild mushroom supplier informed him that this had been the best year to date for the particular fungi.

However it can bring dangers. Horse Whisperer author Nicholas Evans, his brother-in-law Sir Alistair Gordon-Cumming and their wives Charlotte and Louisa all nearly died in 2008 after eating deadly mushrooms picked on Gordon-Cumming’s estate in Moray.

All except Louisa, who only ate a tiny amount, are now awaiting a kidney transplant and must receive daily dialysis to stay alive.