No more morels

Morels--pronounced “mo-rells” but I like to call them “morals” just to aggravate Mr. Eats--are mushrooms. But not just any mushrooms. Mushrooms with a fan base that rival that of a second-string American Idol contestant. The morel has fan pages and message boards and brings people together…together in their forage for a fungus. No other mushroom inspires the fanaticism that the morel does (unless you count the truffle...but a truffle is a truffle, not a mushroom).

So I bought into the hype. Literally--because it's a solid two months past morel season in Tennessee (and I am not one to brave the tick-infested back ways of the Natchez Trace anyway), so I bought some. Typically, they go for about $50 per pound, but Whole Foods had some on sale for just $30 per pound (what a bargain!), so I got half a pound of somewhat fresh, genuine Oregon morels.

I did my research and discovered there is a lot of debate on the proper way to prepare morels. Soak? Don’t soak? Fry? Sauté? Many morel fans assert that soaking the ‘shrooms compromises the flavor. But unless you like critters with your dinner, you have to soak. Yeah, that’s right--that’s the dirty little secret of the mushroom. Many--and particularly the morel--are havens for bugs and worms. And even though the morels I purchased had (ostensibly) been sitting in the store for at least a few days, they contained plenty of larval worms. Larvae of what, I’m not sure. Flies, moths…who knows. All’s I know is nearly every morel had at least one worm--a tiny little white guy with a black spot of a head. Even after soaking, I discovered more.

After soaking and slicing and washing again and even picking through each pore, I battered and fried up about half my batch. Two problems: 1) I’m just not good at frying and 2) I found yet another worm. So Mr. Eats had that batch of fried morels.

So I soaked and picked through the morels again. And then I decided to sauté them in a little olive oil and sea salt. The purpose of this was to get as much of the real morel flavor as possible. Because that’s what it’s all about, right?

Well, I was not impressed. Maybe they were not as flavorful as they should be from all the sitting and the soaking. Maybe my already-queasy stomach could not appreciate them. Maybe I should have had more than three bites, but I just couldn’t go on wondering if there was yet another critter lying in wait inside the mushrooms. Blah blah…FDA and rat feces…I know. There’s all sorts of crap in my food that I don’t really want to eat. But I don’t know it; I don’t SEE it. And I saw these guys. Several of them alive and one of them fried. And it’s just not worth it (see this thread on Chowhound  for a lively discussion of the morel and its unwanted stowaways).

For my money and effort, I will stick with the maitake (hen of the woods), the shiitake, and the oyster. I’m now officially crossing the morel off my to-do list.