If you're in the mood for a little culinary adventure you can head out into the woods and find a surprising number of edible wild mushrooms. Check out this guide to help you find the delicious mushrooms hiding in your own backyard.


Mushrooms grow abundantly all over the world. You've likely got dozens of edible varieties growing right in your backyard and local woodlands. The web site Foraging Guide catalogs edible mushrooms—and poisonous ones too to help you avoid any mishaps—with extremely detailed descriptions. Not only do you get photographs of the mushrooms but the descriptions cover the stem and cap, the size of the pores and the spores the mushroom releases, what habitat you'll find the mushrooms in, and what season to look for them.


The most important information of course is the edibility and the eating/preserving notes. There you'll find a wealth of information like how best to prepare the variety of mushroom you're researching if it's not just edible but also delicious, and what kind of flavors to expect.

If you're heading out into the woods this weekend to try your hand at mushroom collecting here's a pro-tip I gleaned years ago from an old Morel hunter—Morels are a delicious and much prized wild mushroom. Use a mesh laundry bag to collect your mushrooms and swing it gently as you walk. As you swing the mushrooms through the air they will release spores, ensuring a healthy crop of new mushrooms for you and future mushroom foragers. Check out the full guide at the link below.

Foraging Guide [via MakeUseOf]