There are foods that make you wonder how they came to be eaten. For instance, raw olives are phenomenally bitter. They have to be cured in salt for several weeks before they're edible. Who figured that out? Or how about poi? The raw taro root (a corm actually) contains needle-like structures that cause severe stomach pain. It has to be cooked to destroy the needles, but why would you think cooking something inedible would make it edible?
You can theorize that such discoveries are accidental; perhaps some olives were exposed to sea water and then found to be edible. And maybe someone tossed some taro into a pot not knowing it was supposed to make you sick - and no one got sick. But here's the food that bothers me the most: mushrooms.
I was pondering this the other night. A friend of mine had sent me some dried wild mushrooms he'd picked in Oregon and I decided to take advantage of them by making mushroom bisque. I heated some chicken stock on the stove and then dumped the wild mushrooms in it to rehydrate, and as I did so I wondered how skilled my friend was at mycology. But, he's been picking mushrooms for a few years, and hasn't killed himself - yet.
Mushroom Bisque
Serves 4.
2 oz dried wild mushrooms
1 1/2 pounds assorted fresh mushrooms (button, shitake, porcini, ...) - coarsely chopped
1/2 c red wine (optional)
3 tbsp butter
2 tbsp fresh thyme
2 shallots - chopped
salt
1 1/2 c chicken stock
1 c half and half
1 tsp ground black pepper
Bring chicken stock to a boil in a small sauce pan, remove from heat, and add dried mushrooms. Steep mushrooms for 30 minutes while you prep remaining ingredients, then strain liquid through a coffee filter in a sieve to eliminate any dirt.
Place a soup pot over medium high heat and add half of the mushrooms (Note, do not oil the pan.) Sprinkle generously with sauce and cook, stirring occasionally to prevent burning, until the mushroom have reduced by half. Add remaining mushrooms, sprinkle with salt, and add thyme and shallots. Continue cooking until the volume is again reduced to half.
Add wine and reduce to a syrup. Add butter and toss with mushrooms to melt. Add rehydrated mushrooms and stock. Bring to a vigorous simmer, then reduce heat and continue to simmer for 15 minutes. Add half and half. Puree soup using either an immersion blender or standing blender. Return to heat and warm thoroughly.
Serve with a dollop of sour cream or crèam fraîche.
Elise at Simply Recipes offers a similar recipe.
Kevin Weeks is a Gather food correspondent (Paisano), personal chef, cooking teacher, and writer in Knoxville, Tennessee who spends too many hours on his feet, cooking. "Paisano" is a column focused on peasant dishes from around the world. To read more of Kevin's writings or connect to him click here. His blog,Seriously Good, is read by 100,000 cooks a month and in addition he writes a weekly column forSpot-Onand is the Guide for Cooking for Two at About.com.
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Comments: 15
"There are foods that make you wonder how they came to be eaten." Well, I agree with Natalie's comment above but then another way we discover edibles is that I also have Son #1 who habitually bites things and then says, "I hope this won't kill me."
But there are many excellent mushrooms, morrels for example, that can't be cultivated. To enjoy them we must trust those who did the harvesting.
Dorine,
One must choose one mycophiliacs carefully.
Alison,
Yup.
Sandra,
Me too.
Natalie,
I know the harvester well, so while, as with any wild mushroom, there was some risk, I considered it minimal, especially since he'd already eaten some of the harvest before sending them to me.
Marianne,
It is.
Donna,
I like your No 1 son's attitude.
That should have been, "One must choose one's mycophiliacs carefully."
I'll be watching for your best lobster bisque, my personal favorite.
I haven't made lobster bisque in years, I should do it again.
Jo,
I just entered this recipe in a contest to win 2 pounds of fresh morels.
The Black Sapote comes to mind. The flesh of the fruit is a mass of glossy, brown to very black, somewhat jelly-like pulp that looks like a it came from a baby's behind. Even though it is sweet and mild in flavor, that first man who tried it must have been HUNGRY.
Cactus pear. One needs a long-handled tong to pick the fruit from the cactus to avoid bothersome pain. The fruit is covered in glochids which can only be removed by the traditional method of passing the fruit through an open flame or shaking the fruit in a bag of hot coals. They can also be cleaned by cutting them away with a knife or peeling off the skin. Not only is the cleaning of it a pain, once the fruit is removed from the cactus, it rapidly loses nutritional value and may ferment, so it is necessary to consume or process the fruit soon after harvesting. Too much trouble, I tell you!
Rambuta, Lychees, Longans and Mamoncitos. All closely related fruits, all spiny and hairy. Who first looked at them and decided they would be good to eat?
Talking of hairy, what Neanderthal man first found a kiwi and saw beyond the fibrous, dull green-brown, hairy skin, bright green or golden flesh with rows of small, black, seeds and took a first bite?
Ackees. Only the yellow pulp on ripe ackees is edible. Eating underripe ackees that haven't opened on their own, or even eating the pink portion of ripe ackees, can cause vomiting and death. Who would want to try it again? The Jamaicans. Added to saltfish, it is their national dish!
Then there's the Durian, the so-called King of Fruits. That first taster must have had a very bad cold or chronic sinus problem to have even got that adventurous to try that weird fruit with the hard prickly rind and the foulest, most offensive odor of rotting matter. Oy vey!
Mushrooms are a walk in the park, Kevin.