Mushroom dreams

I've been dreaming of hunting edible mushrooms twice now. Last night, I saw huge amounts of boletes, all large and in total abundance. I went after them and harvested them all. Not a dodgy one among them. Lovely dream.

"We're going into the woods today," I announced to OH.

The weather was perfect -- it had rained and was very muddy.

And it's true, there were huge amounts of mushrooms. They were sprouting everywhere. Gilled mushrooms up and down old fallen branches, poking through leafmould... just no boletes. I saw every single deadly poisonous mushroom under the sun -- amanitas, for example a Panthercap, and dozens of Destroying Angels, and two fly agarics, and possibly huge amounts of cortinarius, which are evil because they look like chanterelles but can kill you even two weeks after eating them.

We found about 5 small bay boletes (Xerocomus badius, Maronenroehrling) and two of what I think are Red Cracking Boletes (Xerocomus chrysenteron, Echter Rotfussroehrling), also small. That was it. Last Sunday, we'd been mushroom- and snake-hunting with the boys and discovered 3 very good-sized boletes under some pine trees, where the snakes usually rest. Nothing there today. Meh.

But it was good to be outside. I'm coming down with a stinking cold but always feel better when spending time in the fresh air.

On our way back we swung by our allotment. Things are definitely getting autumnal there now. The squash plants are yellowing. The parsnip leaves are drooping. However, I managed to get a plastic bag full of broccoli off our stalks, and some lovely marigolds and cosmos that are still in flower. Beautiful. Our chard and perpetual spinach plants are doing very well and the leek is coming on too. Huge heads on the red cabbages. Harvested the big-headed marrow but left a small courgette on its stalk for a later picking.

Back home, OH browned off the venison he had bought for today, drowned it in home-made cider, added carrots and onions and popped it on our stove for a slowcook. We had this with creamed kale from the plot -- very nice, much better textured than spinach -- and mashed potatoes and the rest of the home-made cider. Dessert: a chopped Egremont Russet apple each (from our own tree) mixed in with vanilla cream made out of supermarket-own-brand powder and milk, and sprinkled with cinnamon and ground mace. Another one for the Living like Kings series. Picture to follow.