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The parchment milk mushroom, or the lactarius, is a mushroom of the Millechnik family, the Syroezhkov family. In Latin it is called Lactarius pergamenus. It is an independent variety of peppermint. For this reason, it is also called parchment-pepper load. It is classified as a conditionally edible species. They are eaten in a salty form, and before that they are soaked for a long time to remove the bitterness.
Description of parchment weight
This type got its name due to several features: "lump" - due to the fact that it is most often found in heaps, heaps, and parchment - because of the parchment-matte surface of the cap and leg.
Description of the hat
The size of a dense, fleshy cap usually reaches 10 cm in diameter. But in some sources there is information that individual specimens grow up to 20 cm. In young mushrooms, the shape of the cap is convex. As it grows, its edges rise more and more upward, a funnel-shaped shape is created. The center is concave. The hat is dry to the touch, it can be wrinkled or smooth. Skin color is white, yellowish in adult specimens, sometimes with darker, ocher spots.
Miller parchment refers to lamellar mushrooms. It has adherent, narrow, frequent, cream-colored, white, yellowish discs.
The pulp is dense, white. Gives off a large amount of milky juice. It does not change its white color when cut.
Leg description
The leg is strong, dense, smooth. Regardless of the degree of maturity of the fruiting body, the stem is always white. Its shape is cylindrical, narrowing at the bottom. Height - from 5 to 10 cm. The inside of the leg is solid, does not have a characteristic "hole". She also exudes milky juice abundantly. The liquid is very caustic, white in color.
Where and how it grows
The area of growth of the parchment load is a huge territory of the temperate zone from Western Europe to the eastern part of Siberia. The species often grows in the neighborhood with peppercorns. But unlike them, who prefer only mixed forests with a predominance of oaks and birches, parchment milk is found in deciduous and mixed forests. It is very rarely found among conifers. It forms mycorrhiza with both deciduous and coniferous plants.
Prefers calcareous soils. Forming vast colonies, it can withstand even drought conditions. Thanks to this feature, it feels comfortable both on open edges and in the thick of the forest.
The fruiting period occurs in August - September, often in very large groups.
Is the mushroom edible or not
From the point of view of edibility and taste, the species cannot be ranked among the first-class mushrooms.Conditionally edible parchment lactarius have a bitter taste. To remove it, the pulp is thoroughly soaked. After that, the mushrooms acquire nutritional value, according to their nutritional value, they are referred to the fourth category.
Cooking parchment milk mushrooms for the winter requires adherence to technology so that bacteria do not get into the jars during salting. Eating a spoiled product is dangerous for the development of botulism.
Doubles and their differences
The parchment milkman does not have poisonous and inedible twins. Outwardly, it shows a very strong resemblance to several species.
Pepper milk
The similarity is so great that it is ranked among the varieties of pepper milk. The latter still has several differences:
- smooth, not wrinkled surface of the cap;
- shorter leg, up to 7 cm;
- staining of the juice on the cut in a yellowish tint, this sign does not always appear;
- the size of the cap can be much larger, up to 30 cm.
Felt and bluish lump
Other representatives of the genus Millechniks, similar to parchment mushrooms, are felt and glaucous mushrooms. The first differs in the surface of the cap, it is "furry". In the second, the juice turns greenish in air.
However, even the confusion of these species does not matter much for the reason that they all belong to the same family and are conditionally edible. You can eat them after proper processing.
Interesting Parchment Weight Facts
True lovers of quiet hunting can tell a lot of interesting facts about the parchment load:
- The species is extremely rare. In the Moscow region, it was even listed in the Red Book.
- Studying it is not easy, not only because it is difficult to find in the forest, but also because of the similarity to the peppermint.
- Salted milk mushrooms have useful properties: they relieve inflammation, help with lung diseases, and they are also used in folk medicine to prevent stone formation in the urinary and gall bladder, and in the kidneys.
- Mushrooms are rich in vitamin D, and therefore have a beneficial effect on the immune system, on the condition of the skin and hair.
Conclusion
The parchment mushroom, although it can be found infrequently, and it is easy to confuse it with congeners, is valued by mushroom pickers because it is almost never affected by worms. And salted milk mushrooms always take pride of place among mushroom preparations for the winter.
