Black trumpets

I was walking in the rain on an old woods road in Kent when I came upon a trove of one of my favorite edible mushrooms. This was the delectable black trumpet chanterelle, a complex of edible mushrooms with a wide distribution.

Taxonomists recognize Craterellus fallax as the black trumpet variety of eastern deciduous woodlands, and indeed the fruiting bodies of these fungi look like dark horns of plenty with fluted cups.

Lacking gill clusters on their undersides, they have a fragrant aroma and as an added advantage have no poisonous look-alikes.

They fruit in August and September and grow in clusters, and the ones I came upon were conveniently strewn across my path. As I knew what they were and had a bag with me, I gathered my fill.

Even skilled foragers do well to heed the standard cautions of mushroom gathering. Eat nothing you have not definitively verified as edible. Do not gather above your level of knowledge. If you cannot do a spore test, do not collect those fungi that require it. Never eat them raw.

Most importantly, though, don’t let a healthy caution prevent you from educating yourself about these exquisite local delicacies. Many of us were warned as children that mushrooms can kill us, which may have prevented tragedies in our youth but may now prejudice us against some of the finest and most rewarding foraging and feasting opportunities in our region.

I started with the half dozen or so safest varieties. I learned how to distinguish a true puffball — no gills and creamy white all the way through — from one that had gone off in sulfurous green or an immature specimen of another mushroom variety. If it is huge and looks like a volleyball in your yard, though, and it isn’t a ball, you have some good eating ahead of you. I recommend Puffball parmesan.

Sulfur shelf mushrooms are another favorite, especially before they start to get tough and woody. I’ve made an excellent stuffing with them and the bulbs of wild leeks.

Black trumpets, though, are in a class by themselves. They can stand up to rich flavors and are marvelous all on their own. I saute them and pile them on toast points. I make mushroom gravy. I make quiche. I add them to fiddlehead fern soup, conveniently frozen when gathered in spring for just this pairing. I add them to my bagel and lox. I never tire of them.

As will all wild mushrooms, they fruit when conditions are right and may not appear in the same place in subsequent years. It has been a good while since I found black trumpets, and it has always been a serendipitous discovery, like finding a $10 bill buried in your wallet, or falling in love when you least expect it.

Tim Abbott is program director of Housatonic Valley Association’s Litchfield Hills Greenprint. His blog is at greensleeves.typepad.com.