Asheville Mushroom Club

Pickled Honey Mushrooms

2 lb. fresh honeys, cleaned
3/4 c. vinegar
1 1/2 c. water
1/3 c. sugar
1 1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. ground ginger
1 tsp. whole cloves
1 tsp. ground allspice
garlic salt to taste

Place mushrooms in a large bowl. (Larger mushrooms may be cut into bite size pieces.) Mix vinegar, water, sugar, salt, and ginger and bring to a boil. Pour hot syrup over mushrooms and set aside until mushrooms shrink. Pack in small jars, adding 1 or 2 cloves, pinch of allspice and dash of garlic salt to each jar. Seal tightly with lids. Cure at least one week before using.

Word from Ginger: I have made these and enjoy them with goat cheese on crackers, or as a condiment with a meal.

This recipe is featured in "Cooking with the Asheville Mushroom Club" cook book on page 147.

Club members have collected hundreds of recipes featuring local
and cultivated mushrooms to create a unique specialty cookbook.

Purchase your copy at club meetings for $10 or by ordering from Ken McGill, PO Box 182, Campobello, SC 29322 for $14.95.

Each month we'll be highlighting one mushroom that can be found in WNC during that current month. This is in an attempt to help members or guests learn our local mushrooms. It will also be noted whether the mushroom is edible, ill advised, or poisonous.

Armillaria melea group - (aka honey mushrooms)

If you have been out in the oak woods in the last few weeks, you’ve probably seen this one. Yellow brown cap with erect black hairs, a cream colored ring, cream to discolored gills, and a tough stem in groups on wood with a white spore print. This is NOT a mushroom for the novice as it could be confused with the deadly Gallerina.

Go with the group and take your time getting to know this one. Since the days when I learned this one it has been divided into at least 6 different species, so expect some variability in your collection. Once well learned and thoroughly cooked it can make a great addition to late summer and fall meals.

On your walks look for trees that are past maturity (dead limbs, falling over etc). (always check around declining/dying trees for mushrooms & not just honeys) Honeys can appear in large groups on the trunk, around the base or they can appear to be coming from the ground but are actually on the roots. I like to cut them off just below the ring as the stem is very tough & inedible. One can often gather a large amount (bushels) of this mushroom, therefore one must consider preservation. These MUST be very well cooked to avoid gastric upset so I suggest only two preservation methods: pressure canning (as I have previously described) and duxelles (finely chopped, well cooked with butter and frozen).

Unfortunately honey mushrooms are parasitic and the forest where they are found is in decline. If you are saving your timber for your retirement or a child’s education and find honeys in your timber it’s time to start logging. Honeys are quite invasive and efficient killers, so I would suggest gathering these in a paper bag to prevent spreading the spores to healthy trees near you home.

Steve Peek, field mycologist and long standing member of the Asheville Mushroom Club