at the moment, wild garlic and the elusive (and very expensive) morel mushrooms. Keep your eyes peeled and enjoy

Morcheln in German, Spugnole in Italian.

Now the season for St George's mushrooms - if you are in NE region, got tons growing at home in our meadow- come help yourself next week.

Anyone? Now we have had some rain, if the sun comes out again, conditions should be excellent.

Found some ceps/bolets/porcinis last week and a lot of Millers- looking forward to my walks in the woods and clearings next week. Too cold today, and never go out at week-ends.

Chestnuts and parasol mushrooms.

Tom

In the fall of 2019, our neighbours (who own a forested area) brought home almost the limit of 2kg of porcini (steinpilze) in a laundry basket and gave it all away. I had the luxury of 400g to make a mascarpone-porcini tart. Heaven!

no chestnuts up here, but must go and look for hazelnuts. Like plums, they tend to be plentiful every 3 years or so. Imagine the early fruits, will have been hacked by the hail in June. Same as rowans, etc- so even more essential than ever to feed birds this winter.

The 'spot' where I usually find my parasols has had none this year or last ...

Morels come in the fall here? That is interesting to me. I did not even know they were found in Switzerland. Now I have another hobby that I can start up again.

No, look at the date of the OP- April. The season always starts with morels, then St Georges... and then we have to wait till autumn. I used to find morels in the Peak District, on limestone too- but very very few!

Those morels are hard to find - very elusive, for sure! I am lucky to have a large fairy ring of St Georges in our meadow- because we are at altitude, they don't come end of April (as per name, St George being 23rd April)- but mid to late May. This year lots of them went to waste, as I still had some dried ones from previous year, and there is only so much you can eat. I advertised them for free locally, but no-one took my offer up.

Sun has come out, but it is very windy and cold- so I ain't going today.

Sorry: It showed up on the New Post page; so I thought it had just been made. Glad to see seasons are not that different here, but good to know about the morels.

I will be out looking next spring.

Hazelnuts are long gone here. I saved the harvest from the oachkazel, cute as they are. You can take down the nut clusters when you first see the squirrels coming. They take down a 6-nut cluster, eat one, and leave the rest on the ground. That's the signal. You can take those up, take the remaining clusters off the tree, and store them somewhere dry, and they will continue to ripen. My neighbour left his on the tree, and they ate every.single.nut.

It was a good year for elderberries, at least where I go. The rose hips are looking good, I usually wait until after the first frost for those.

So looking forward to my friends really good harvest of truffle again this year - her dog has a quite a talent of sniffling it out (yes - even in Zurich - or especially in Zurich). And my friend has the talent of harvesting it responsibly.

Anyone wondering about finding truffles in Zurich with a dog, then this might be of interest (not the friend I mentioned BTW):

https://www.tagesanzeiger.ch/auf-tru...h-121953733004

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We have the most wonderful black elderberry tree that came from our UK garden- dark wine colour leaves and pink flowers- but it was all hacked up by the hail late June- leaves have grown back but no fruit- same for the rowans. I think that is why the birds are so hungry now- no 'wild' fruit to be had.

The bise dropped and it actually was quite nice and warn for the rest of the afternoon- really enjoyed being in the garden, and I ate all the rest of the raspberries. No foraging for me at week-ends.

Movie tip, The Truffle Hunters, (saw in a cinema but imagine it can be streamed…somewhere)

Found a slight kg of chanterelles a few weeks back near Lavin, GR - and other edible types the worms had found first.

Found a link - thank you!

Sambucus nigra "Black Lace." I have one too, and it didn't do well this year. I think it didn't like the wet cold spring.

Hope you like it - one of my favourites in long while…movie foraging season in progress

Does anyone know what “chicken of the forest” is called in these parts? A friend visiting from Edinburgh was delighted with her forest find, I had never knowingly encountered one

Are you referring to chicken-of-the-woods--Laetiporus sulphureus? Poule des bois/Schwefelporlinge? They grow on deciduous tree wounds. I've never eaten one, but all the guides say proceed with caution because some people can't digest them.