Mushroom Picking Parties (Poland tradition)

we used to go to the Kaszuby area and pick----- Podpinki and Maszlaki.

Actually, the Japanese call this one maitake. It can be cultivated, but it's not nearly as good as what you can pick in the wild. They grow almost exclusively at the bases of oak trees in September and October. A single tree can produce a good 20-30 pounds of it.


Where is this? What major towns is it near?


Do you have photos? I'd like to see what these are.

Dec 1, 09, 04:29 - Thread attached on merging:
Mushrooms in Poland

What are common kinds of mushrooms found in Polish forests?

pics of mushrooms from somewhere in russia(i hope it is not from Chernobyl fallout)
i think ,it is prawdziwek
sorry, file too big. and edit post does not allow to attach pictures.

I have said this before , but maybe no harm in saying it again...If you are not 100% certain that the mushroom is safe to eat , then DO NOT EAT IT... there are reports that some of the deadly ones actually taste quite nice , people have said so , just before they died...!

You can buy all kinds of books on the subject , but sometimes , even with great photos in a book its very difficult to identify all of them , there are some mushrooms that can be eaten , that look very similar to ones that you definatly should not eat....

If you really want to go picking mushrooms , the safest thing is to go with a local Polish person , even the city folk seem to be pretty clued up on whats ok to eat , and what is not , mind you , even they can make mistakes...

Its not just death you need to worry about , some of the mushrooms on the danger list can make you very ill , and leave you with permenant and severe damage....

Enjoy your Polish mushrooms , they are the best...just be carefull....

That's correct - when in doubt, throw it out. Even experts make mistakes that kill them. But the most frequent victims of mushroom poisoning, after children and dogs (because they eat everything) are people who pick a mushroom and eat it because they are sure that it is the same mushroom that they picked "back home." In USA it is most often people of Asian descent who mistake Amanita bisporigera for the "paddy straw mushroom" that they pick in their native country. But it's not just Asians. We had a Latin American woman in Westchester County, NY who did that in the summer of 2008.

Every year at this time we start planning a mushroom picking outing.It's great to get out in the outdoors this time of year.

• 
  Not to be eaten-Beware
  
• 
  excellent-one of the best
  
• 
  lot's of these around
  

Ever seen



In Russian we call it "Polsky Grib" (The Polish mushroom).

In Poland it's known as "podgrzybek brunatny". Why do you call it Polish mushroom?
Bay bolete in English.

Yeah, I read it in Polish wiki. :) Brunatny=brown?


I'm not sure about the ethimology. That probably somehow related to to Poles who lived in Russia... or maybe there's a belief that it was firstly brought from Poland. Another name of it "Pansky grib", as you see there's also trace of Poland in this name. :)

Some people call it also "dubovik" (dub=oak-tree), but that's wrong. Dubovik is what pawian posted above:

Polkamania, why in the world would you post a photo of an Amanita species and label it this way? Even if your identification is 100% correct (I presume you believe this to be Amanita caesarea), the chances that anyone other than an expert could do the same are minimal. You know that species in this genus are among the deadliest on the planet, and that others, some of which look remarkably like the one in this poto, are toxic and hallucinogenic.

Please be more responsible when discussing edible mushrooms with novices. Thanks.

Looks like a deformed "Kozak" to me. Now here’s something for Sasha. Russian flavor of the Polish name of mushroom. As for the “podgrzybek” you can usually find them at the edge of the forest and in SE Poland they are plentiful. I rarely pick them, there are better variety to pick but if the pickings are slim of course you take those too.


Because there’s a variety picked in Poland "Czubajka" or "kania" (Macrolepia procera) that is very similar to and often confused with "muchomor sromotnikowy" (Amanita phalloides) "death cap" which is lethal. They are excellent; the way to prepare them is to fry them up in batter like a pork chop. But this one is not even close to neither one.

ShortHairThug,
The dangerous look-alike to Macrolepiota procera is not an Amanita, it's Chlorophyllum molybdites. Although I concede that an amateur may mistake an Amanita for either one fo those. My point is that promoting the picking of anything that even remotely resembles a toxic mushroom to amateurs is irresponsible. They should be instructed to stick with only those species that are known to be both delicious and impossible to mistake for another species until their expertise is greatly enhanced with experience and education.

By the way - I agree with your identification of the deformed kozak. In the US there are new warnings about the edibility of these and other Leccinum species, and I hope that most mushroom-hunters heed these warnings, because that leaves more of them for me. They are among my favorite edibles. Amateurs - beware the kozaki!

Rakky