This week we 'pick' the brain of morel expert Kristen Blizzard (see what we did there? 'Pick' the brain? Har, har.) Kristen and her husband run ModernForager.com, an online resource for foragers across the country. Kristen tells us about everyone's favorite -- the morel -- plus other mushrooms you can easily add to your repertoire with a little extra know-how. We also discuss how to harvest for success in the kitchen. The culinary possibilities are endless!

3:40 - Harvesting arnica when the mushrooms aren't in

5:00 - Kristen and Trent Blizzard run ModernForager.com

9:40 - Mushrooms totally have a terroir, a sense of flavor imparted by the place they were harvested. It's simply lovely.

12:30 - What apple is to tree, mushroom is to mycelium. The mycelial network is everywhere! Under every forest floor. They're tree-like. 

14:30 - "The Wood-Wide Web" – check it out

https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2016/04/the-wood-wide-web/478224/; https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/radiolab/articles/from-tree-to-shining-tree

21:00 - Morel hunting wonderfully overlaps with spring bear season. Wild mushrooms complement wild game so beautifully.

23:00 - Adding a new mushroom to your foraging repertoire is a big deal! On posting a mushroom pic to an online forum, and having multiple different (very confident) answers on what it is

24:00 - Coral mushrooms are very hard to tell apart. Some cause gastric upset, others are fine. (Corals = mushroom jerky)

26:00 - Safe foraging is like any hobby: The more you do it, the better you get. Don't eat random mushrooms. Work on your ID skills

28:00 - People from Michigan = Michiganders

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