Lobster Mushroom Chowder

I just returned from a week long Boundary Waters trip - one of the highlights of which included eating lots of wild mushrooms! On last year's fall trip, My Charming Companion and I regretted not bringing a mushroom guide with us because there were so many mushrooms everywhere in the north woods. This year My Charming Companion did a bunch of research and made a handy cheat sheet.

Definitely not a beanie baby

Boletes lined most of the portages we crossed, and though I didn't get any photos, they are a delicious, buttery mushroom. The lobsters were the most spectacular though. I had only just heard of their existence on a portage; a young guy doing some wolf research with the forest service was seeming quite depressed because after 2 weeks they had yet to find any wolves, and his group was down to the lackluster meal options. My Charming Companion was showing him boletes, because the only mushroom the wolfer knew of prior to that were lobster mushrooms. I had never heard of them, and didn't ask any more. Later that afternoon upon arriving at our campsite, I was visiting the latrine when I looked over and saw what appeared to be a bright red beanie baby lying in the woods. If something is called a lobster mushroom, I thought - than this must be it!

One lobster lead to several more - the easiest mushroom hunt ever because nothing else is that color in the woods. We didn't see any more of these anywhere else on the trip, so somehow this site on clearwater lake was a lobster mushroom hotbed. They were delicious! Apparently these mushrooms are actually a mold that grows over the mushroom. It's the prettiest mold I've ever seen, but is why the shapes vary A LOT. Some are like shells, others are more bulbous. And they have a slight seafood scent when raw and cooking. They taste really nice, and are quite firm. They hold their shape well. We ate them once sauteed in some ghee with eggs, and again in a chowder (while Clearwater lake was bountiful in lobster mushrooms, it was bereft of fish - so what would otherwise have been a fish chowder, was a "lobster" chowder instead - ha).

If you ever come across these, a simple butter/ghee saute would be great. They can cook awhile, and they will turn the butter an orangey color. To prep: trim away any dirt areas, and slice in nice large slices. Some of them had brown spots - or lines really - I'm guessing it was the inner mushroom, or that they were older. I cut those parts out because we had so many and I wasn't sure about it, but upon some research at home, it seems fine to eat that too.

For our chowder, we started sauteing the mushrooms (in ghee) first since we had to do it in two batches (due to limited cooking vessels). Meanwhile we chopped up a few slices of bacon and cooked them, than added dehydrated onions, peppers, celery, and a few potatoes along with a bunch of water to hydrate everything. The hydration takes a good 15 minutes or so, and we added the mushrooms once they had softened and been sauteed a bit - there were too many mushrooms to fit in our largest pot, so we had a bit of overflow! Then we added some salt, pepper, and cajun seasoning and simmered everything another 10-15 minutes. We stirred up a bit of cream powder, and mixed that in at the end. It was delicious!