This strong-looking mushroom is familiar to most of our compatriots. It is very nutritious and tasty, which determined its popularity among gourmets. It is not very difficult to find him in any wild forest. The main thing in this business is the ability to distinguish it from false mushrooms - poisonous "relatives" and grebes.
This is a wonderful mushroom boletus. Where does it grow, how to distinguish it from other mushrooms, what valuable properties does it have? The answers to these and other questions can be found in the article.
Places of growth
Mushrooms grow in places where there is spruce, pine, birch or oak. They choose dry places. In shaded low-lying moist areas and among swamps, they do not grow.
It is likely in the summer to meet him in small groves and small plantings. In autumn, you can search for them in the depths of the old forest or at the edges. You can meet them along paths and forest roads, as well as on slopes. Usually they grow in groups, and if you are lucky enough to meet at least one mushroom, you can certainly find the following.
Why do people call these mushrooms white, even though their hat is dark brown and the leg is brownish? The reason is as follows: when dried, salted or pickled, the flesh does not darken, and remains white in the mushroom.
Description
Borovik (Bolet) is a genus of fungi belonging to the Boletov family. The so-called White mushroom (one of the common species of the genus).
In the terminology of scientific “boletus” is a genus of fungi that includes about 300 species. Among them are both edible and poisonous. But in everyday life, boletus is usually called only one species - porcini mushroom.
In describing the appearance, the difficulty lies in the fact that this mushroom is very variable, since it is found in almost all forests of the northern hemisphere. Some scientists distinguish up to 18 subspecies of boletus, differing in color, size and maturation.
And yet, a generalized description of the fungus can be made. It has large sizes. The hat of a mature specimen reaches sizes ranging from 7 to 30 cm (and even up to 50 cm). The old mushroom has a slightly flattened hat, but not open.
General characteristics:
- massive fruit body, hat-cutaneous;
- hat round or pillow-shaped, smooth or velvety;
- a fibrous or mesh (rarely smooth) leg is thickened in the middle part or at the base;
- the pulp is white or yellow, on the cut it turns blue in many species, a little less often - remains unpainted or turns red;
- spore powder has various shades of brown.
In general, it can be called a beautiful mushroom, which can be immediately noticed during a walk through the forest.
About the forms of mushrooms
The most popular among 18 forms are spruce, oak, pine and birch boletus:
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Mushroom boletus spruce. It grows in the middle zone of the northern part of Russia, in spruce and mixed forests. His hat has a light brown or brown tint. A fairly long leg to the base expands. From mid-July to early September - the time of collection of these mushrooms.
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Oak boletus. The mushroom has a brownish hat with a gray tint. It occurs from July to early October in preserved oak forests. This form is thermophilic.
- Pine boletus. This is a more stocky mushroom with a hat of a dark red-brown shade. The leg below is very thick. It occurs from July to September in pine light forests with sandy soil.
- Birch boletus. It occurs in June-October mainly in birch and mixed forests. The shade of the hat is reddish yellow or light brown. The short leg is thick.
All these types of mushrooms are edible.
The nutritional value
It is believed that this genus has the most valuable properties among cap mushrooms. Borovik has not so much exceptional nutritional properties as excellent taste and ability to stimulate the work of the entire digestive system. White mushroom has many useful substances: vitamins, proteins, extractive and mineral substances. It belongs to the first category.
The worms and other forest inhabitants liked its useful properties, and therefore, before preparing them, it should be well soaked in salted water so that all living creatures float to the surface.
And today, in some Russian villages, pickled and dried porcini mushrooms continue to be pickled. They usually eat it boiled and fried.
False mushrooms
Inexperienced mushroom pickers may well confuse the mushroom mushroom with mushrooms similar to it (poisonous and inedible).
Especially like bile mushroom (false boletus). It is not poisonous, but it has a very bitter taste, which is why it is impossible to eat it. Distinctive signs from boletus mushroom:
- the cap does not exceed 10 cm in diameter;
- the flesh at the cut site turns red;
- due to the bitter taste, does not worm;
- the net pattern on the leg is slightly darker than the main color (the cep is lighter).
Another false mushroom is satanic. He is a close relative, as he belongs to the same genus - Boroviki. This is a very toxic mushroom that can not be eaten at all. It is not difficult to identify, but sometimes it is very similar to a porcini mushroom. Features:
- the main feature is the color of the leg, which is usually orange or red (the shade is always darker and more saturated than that of the hat, while white is the opposite);
- the hat never has a brown color (usually it is grayish, white or olive-gray);
- on the cut, the white flesh of the hat visibly turns red or blue, and the flesh in the leg initially has a reddish color;
- old mushrooms have an unpleasant odor;
- the stalk of a young mushroom has a spherical or ovoid shape, and with age it becomes repetitive or barrel-shaped (narrowed up), but not cylindrical.
