Subject: Beware the red capped scaber stalk boletus

From: [email-masked] (Ryan Sawby)
Date: 15 Nov 1994 02:14:19 GMT

Most guides describe the red capped scaber stalk, Leccinum 
aurantiacum, as edible and choice.  I, however, have found this to be 
untrue for myself.  My father and I grilled a beautiful specimen, along 
with some freshly caught kokanee, in our camp after a great day of 
fishing.  Pop, in his wisdom and general practice of avoiding boletes (he 
had a bad run-in with boletus soup years past), elected not to try the 
"delectable" treat.  The sliced mushroom fried quite nicely, adopting its 
characteristic black and slimy texture.  It went down well with the fish, 
too, for about the first two hours, that is.  What followed was not 
something I ever want to repeat, I vomited every hour until dawn.  I 
concluded, perhaps prematurely, that the mushroom I ate had disagreed 
with me.  I have no desire to test my hypothesis further.  Pop and I 
speculated that we might have some heritable sensitivity to some 
boletus-specific chemical.  I do not want to test this hypothesis either, 
and think it best to avoid boletes in the future.
	Of course I may have misidentified the mushroom, but I think it 
unlikely.  L. aurantiacum has the red cap, black scabers on the stalk, 
and characteristically stains first burgundy-red then purplish.  Consider 
yourselves warned, I for one will stick with morels and shaggy manes for 
awhile.

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Ryan Sawby                     Encumbered forever by desire and ambition.
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