I'll borrow Geiger's counter from my Russian friend and will test this hypothesis

Post the results, could be very interesting.

Found this in the wilderness I laughingly call my garden the other day....
25cms high and weighing in at 247g.
Totally self-seeded (self-spored?, taken ~16 years to happen though and there was just the one. As I wasn't 100% sure that it was a morel I swapped it for a couple of bottles of wine; the chef at the local restaurant was thrilled with it!

I often get mushrooms such as Shaggy Ink Caps growing in the lawn, but this is the first morel I've ever seen out there.

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Actual radioactive contamination depends on a large part on whether it rained when the radioactive cloud passed. Austria and southeastern Germany (Bayern, parts of BW) had rain, as did the swiss shore of the Lake of Constance and the Ticino, plus small parts of the Jurs mountains. Because of that there will be huge differences in measurement results depending on the region tested. Also take note that most cards showing radioactivity incurred from Tchernobyl use a logarithmic scale.

Plus, since chemical products of Caesium can be soluble, it's not enough to consider radioactive decay only. You need to account for typical precipitation as rain over time washes it out, which obviously is a disadvantage for Ticino when compared to CH north of the Alps or Bayern/Baden-Württemberg.

What's more, with edible mushrooms there are huge differences in how much they take in, factors of 20x or even more are far from extraordinary. Unfortunately Steinpilz and Morchel aren't among those taking in little.

With that said, if you intend to use for instance Morchel or Steinpilz anyway, you may well be better off using your own finds rather than buying in a store. Because Morcheln and Steinpilz are typically imported from eastern Europe, Poland in particular, which in some parts got hit by quite a bit more than CH.

A bit off topic but I remember the mutated dandelions and willow branches from the time.

Malformations and mutations are a normal part of evolution. How many malformations are found these days, how many were found shortly after Tchernobyl, and how many before Tchernobyl?

If you read reports on Tchernobyl as it is today, plants seem to have adjusted to radioactivity fairly well, and with much less problems than animals. As such one would expect to see during Tchernobyl itself many more reports on mutations in animals than in plants, even more so as animals ar probably better overseen (e.g. farmers). Not to speak of humans, where for instance leucemia and trisomy-21 (down syndrom) should have increased by a lot. Nothing to that end was registered.

However in the period immediately after the "incident" there was an increase in birth defects in animals and humans.
http://www.wissenschaft-und-frieden....artikelID=1132
Especially cancers.

I had Germany and Switzerland in mind when I wrote in #26 that one should see effects on humans. My bad.

Great year for morels- after 2 very poor years. One local picked 6.5 kilos the other day! Sadly not able to go galivanting up and down scree slopes where they love to grow, at the moment- but getting rid of crutches now so there is a couple of mad dad's old spots which are more accessible so will be going hunting next week. Need to replenish my stores.

I grew up hunting wild mushrooms and can easily call myself an expert. Dad lived to 96 on wild mushrooms and mum to 94 - so I am not going to worry about it. Not will I worry about eating wild stawberries, blueberries or raspberries, wild garlic and sorrel, nettles and many many other wild foods.

Care to share a bit of your knowledge where usually you can find them and when?

ahahah NO WAY those secrets were passed on by my dad over a lifetime, and are mine, all mine and will only be passed on to my daughters and grandchildren! Anywhere in the Jura mountains will do at this time of year- in the Alps you have to wait for June. Late May here will be St George's mushrooms season. Fortunately we have a massive ring of them in one of our fields- so 100 m from my kitchen door for an every day kilo over a few weeks - and I dry a lot too. Mine, all mine (well I do share with friends- and a lot finds its way to my daughters' kitchens in the UK too).

Happy to show you where to get wild garlic and organic nettles and sorrel, and sloes for sloe gin in the autumn, as well as wild hazelnuts- but not my mushrooms- apart from the St Georges as I get tons of them.

I am not an expert in wild mushrooms so would never adventure to pick some just by myself, but I will go hunting some nettles...
(oh, and sorrel, it is excellent in soups)

If interested find a "Pilzkontrolle" near you, you can have your finds checked there for free.

I'm not sure how well this works these days, AFAIK a sizeable number had to close due to insufficient funds (lean government you know, if some people have to bite the dust because of these cuts that's just too bad).

I used to know a mushroom enthusiast. Quite a fun guy. After the police found some psilocybin on him, he had his Liberty Capped.

You, dear lady are a bad bad egotist, to keep all those lovely "champignons" to yourself.

i admire everyone who forages for mushrooms, I am only going after herbs, blossoms,berries, wild fruits and such stuff.
Way too scared to forage for 'shroomies.

Having said this, the elder flower season has started and allows to make so many yummy things with it.


Why not start a general FORAGING thread ??

Would anybody be interested in that?

As apparently there are quite a few of us who do it, and then we could share what can be made of the foraged items or how many different ways we can use/preserve them etc.

I am always keen to learn more about this as well learn about many more wild plants etc we can actually use for us humans.

I've got about 10 dried morels from my Polish friend the other day!! She picked them a couple of weeks ago and packed them in a really nice box for me. They seem so precious now I'm afraid to start cooking them!
I will ask OH to find a recipe and cook...

How big are they? Here are just 3 really very very easy ideas for you.

You could soak them in a milk water and then stuff them with a herby cream cheese for example and steam them.

OR

Soak them, cut them in halves or smaller pieces. Fry a shallot in some butter, add morels, stir for 2-3 minutes......add cream, simmer for about 10 mins, season to taste and serve either as a sauce to pork steaks or over toast as a "Morchelschnitte"

OR

Make a risotto, add the morels for the last 10 minutes of cooking the risotto...et voilà.
Dried morels are much more flavoursome than fresh ones....love them

I think they are quite big or at least medium sized for dried morels, I don't know, maybe 6-7 cm long.
I am very tempted by the Morchelschnitte because it seems easy to cook and I have never tried it so far. (or maybe the third suggestion but only if my husband feels like cooking, he is the one who makes a top notch Risotto )
Thanks a lot, EastEnders.

Any more, tried and tested ideas of you, of what to do with elder flowers

I am totally addicted to it, and have exhausted my knowledge and cookbooks now.....

I know Google is your friend, but I am after recommended ideas of people who tried and tested them, maybe old family favourites.

So far I have made:

Syrup ( i think it is what in the UK is called cordial)
Gelee (some wine and some water based, it is like quince jelly, one version for grown ups, the other for kids)
full fat ice cream
sorbet with prosecco
elderflower flavoured icing sugar
flavoured vinegar
liqueur
dried flowers (for tea)
flower fritters

Syrup is also used for things such as Maybowls and similar......

What else could I try to make with them?

Was going to invite you to share a meal of St Georges mushrooms EastEnders- but we were in the UK and came back too late. I found the big fairy ring full of tons of them, but too big and too soggy- too late. Picked the smallest and cooked them at the week-end- delish. So next year.

Due to my knee replacement late March, I also missed the massive 'morilles' harvest this year - what a shame. Some people around here got basket fulls- very un-usual.

We brought an dark red leaved (nigra) elderflower tree from our UK garden- and it has done so well here. The leaves are dark crimson and very finely cut, and the flowers pink- the elderflower cordial I make with them is also a lovely pink colour and wonderful.

Our field is full of wild and tender sorrel at the moment- I wonder what the horses think of it (not my horses, the neighbours who are put to pasture in our field).