Black Chanterelle Mushrooms

Black Chanterelle Mushrooms.

Black Chanterelle Mushrooms.. There are a couple different species, but for this post, I’m referring to craterellus fallax Known as the “La Trompette de Mort” or trumpet of death in French. With their all-black structure, I’ve heard people say looking for them is like looking for holes in the ground, and that’s not far from the truth. Famous Mycologist Chuck Barrows went until he was 60 without finding a single one. I was lucky, it only took me 4 years.

From my experience, when you’re hunting them you want to look for moist, shady areas, typically in the middle of summer in the Midwest, say from June-August. They may be close to a small source of water or a wet/swampy area where there’s decaying and dead wood.

HABITAT

Where do Black Chanterelle Mushroomss grow? In my area, around white Oak trees in Minnesota, as well as with pine. A good trick to remember is that trumpets like to be often in the same areas chanterelles will grow, so if you keep your eye out for the easy-to-spot golden chanterelles you can get lucky.

SYMBIOTIC, OR NO?

An interesting thing I’ve noticed, and something you can use to your advantage, is that trumpets seem to operate in two ways: mycorrhizally, and saprobically, meaning that they grow both in harmony with certain trees, and will seem to live off of decaying matter. Contrastingly, golden chanterelles only grow mycorrhizally. Most of the time with Black Chanterelle Mushrooms from my experience, they’ll be one or the other but not both, which makes black trumpets extra special. If that wasn’t interesting enough, there’s more than one species to learn about and enjoy, each one with slightly different characteristics. Two I’ve found are craterellus foetidus and craterellus cinereus, but supposedly there are others too.

COOKING

Black Chanterelle Mushrooms have one of the most potent flavors of all wild mushrooms, especially fresh. They may be small, and flimsy, but they pack a serious punch. As thye’re hollow, black trumpets, like their cousins yellowfoot chanterelles cook very fast. Once they hit the pan they’re pretty much done, but they make up for their small stature with a great flavor which is intense, and echoes their smell: exciting, woodsy and deep, with a hint of something sweet.

Like most mushrooms, these marry wonderfully with cream. Like other chanterelles, I would caution you to cook these by themselves, their flavor can be overwhelmed by other mushrooms such as morels, or by really strong flavors like garlic, smoke food, or spicy seasonings. One of my favorite ways to eat them is to chop them finely, and make a sauce with them using meat stock to garnish a plate, but they’ll enhance, soups, sauces, butters, salads, pasta’s, you name it, just remember what you make will be Black Chanterelle Mushrooms, or speckled, or both.