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The semi-white mushroom is a good edible species, which is also called semi-white pain, yellow moss or semi-white boletus. It is beneficial for the body, but before collection, you need to carefully study the features of the species and its photographs in order to avoid mistakes.
What semi-white boletuses look like
The semi-white boletus has a fairly standard structure for a bolt. At a young age, his hat is convex and half spherical, later it becomes flattened and cushion-shaped, and reaches 15 cm in diameter.
The cap is covered with a thin but tight skin, smooth to the touch and dull, but often wrinkled in adult fruiting bodies. It is usually dry, but mucus may appear on it in rainy weather. In color, the semi-white mushroom Boletus Impolitus can be clay or light brown, the lower surface of the cap is tubular and yellowish, with small pores that acquire an olive tint with age.
The leg can rise up to 15 cm above the ground, in the girth it reaches about 6 cm. There is a noticeable thickening in its lower part. The color of the leg is predominantly beige, and in the upper part it is lighter, and in the lower part it is much darker and sometimes with a reddish tint. There are also villi in the lower part of the leg, but there is usually no mesh pattern on its surface.
If you break a half-white mushroom in half, then the flesh will turn out to be dense, whitish or lemon-yellow, with a neutral or weak carbolic odor. From contact with air, the pulp does not change color - this is a characteristic feature of semi-white boletus.
Where half-white pains grow
Semi-white boletus belongs to the category of thermophilic species that prefer moist soils. You can meet him in Russia mainly in the southern regions and in the Central region. Usually, a semi-white mushroom grows in mixed and deciduous forests under hornbeams, beeches and oaks; it is rare to see it under conifers.
The period of maximum fruiting occurs in late summer and early autumn. The first mushrooms appear in May, but grow in the largest quantities from mid-August to October.
Are semi-white mushrooms edible or not
Although the semi-white ache does not have a very pleasant odor, this aroma disappears after initial processing. From the point of view of edibility, boletus of this species is completely suitable for food consumption. According to many mushroom pickers, it is in no way inferior to porcini mushroom, or even surpasses it in taste.
False doubles
Experienced mushroom pickers can easily distinguish semi-white pain from other species.However, beginners may confuse boletus with similar varieties, some of which are edible and inedible.
Porcini
In the absence of experience, you can confuse a semi-white mushroom with an ordinary white one - the varieties are almost identical to each other in size and structure. But there are also differences - the cap of a white painter is usually a darker, brown shade without an admixture of lemon color. The leg of the white pain is mostly beige, darker in the lower part and lightening closer to the cap.
You can also distinguish varieties by smell. For white pain, the weak carbolic aroma present in semi-white is uncharacteristic. Both types are completely edible, but require preliminary preparation - a short soaking and boiling.
Borovik girlish
Another edible counterpart of the semi-white mushroom is the maiden boletus, which is rarely found in the deciduous forests of the southern regions. The varieties have the same structure of caps and legs, are similar in size and color.
But at the same time, the girlish boletus is darker - yellow-brown, red-brown or brown-brown in the cap. The leg of the girl's mushroom is lemon-yellow, brownish in the lower part, with a pronounced mesh, but it is usually thinner than that of the semi-white one.
Green flywheel
The edible mushroom has a certain resemblance to the semi-white boletus - its cap is of the same shape, cushion-shaped in adulthood and convex in young fruiting bodies. But the color of the green flyworm is olive-yellow or olive-brown, and although its leg is high, it is very thin, only up to 2 cm in diameter.
You can also distinguish a green flywheel if you press on the cap or cut it, the pulp will quickly turn blue. The aroma of the green mushroom resembles dried fruit and is quite pleasant, in contrast to the smell of semi-white boletus. Although the bottom layer of the cap is tubular in both species, the pores of the green flyworm are much larger.
Beautiful boletus
Sometimes you can confuse a semi-white boletus with a beautiful inedible boletus - a mushroom of a similar shape and size. But the differences in the double are very noticeable - his hat has an olive-gray tint.
The leg of a beautiful boletus is thick and dense, clavate, while its upper part is lemon-yellow, the middle part is bright red, and closer to the base the leg becomes red-brown. For a semi-white mushroom, such transitions of shades on the stem are not characteristic, although both species have a light mesh on the stem. The flesh on the cut from the inedible beautiful boletus quickly turns blue.
Root boletus
Another inedible species, the rooted boletus, has a certain similarity with the semi-white mushroom. Although the varieties are similar in size and structure, the difference between them is quite large.
The cap of the rooting pain is light gray, usually much lighter than that of the semi-white. The legs of the two species are very similar, but the root of the rooting boletus at the base is usually brown-brown or with greenish-blue spots. On the cut, the inedible boletus acquires a bright blue color.
Collection rules
It is best to go to the forest for half-white boletus in mid-August. From this time until mid-autumn, the mushroom bears fruit most actively. The most rapid growth of fruiting bodies usually occurs after rainy days.
You need to choose clean forests for collection, located away from industrial facilities and major roads. Since mushroom pulp quickly accumulates toxic substances in itself, fruit bodies grown in contaminated areas can be hazardous to health. It is better to collect young semi-white pains, they are denser in structure, pleasant to the taste and also contain a minimum of toxic substances from the air and soil in their pulp.
How to cook half white mushrooms
Semi-white is considered a versatile mushroom - it can be boiled, fried, pickled, salted and dried for long storage. Before any method of processing, except for drying, fruit bodies must be cleaned of forest debris, if necessary, cut and soak for an hour to remove light bitterness from the pulp. Boil the pain for about half an hour in salted water, the broth must be drained, toxins may remain in it.
Marinating half-white pain
A popular cooking method is to marinate a semi-white mushroom. The recipe looks very simple:
- 1 kg of fruit bodies is boiled for half an hour;
- the broth is drained, and the mushrooms are thrown into a colander;
- in another bowl, water is boiled with 2 large tablespoons of salt, 1 large spoonful of sugar, 3 cloves and 5 peppercorns;
- after boiling, 100 ml of vinegar is poured into the marinade and boiled mushrooms are laid;
- after another 15 minutes, the mushrooms and marinade are removed from the heat.
After that, the prepared sterile jars are spread with onions along the bottom, mushrooms are placed on top and poured with hot marinade. The containers are tightly closed and, after cooling, are stored in the refrigerator.
Frying a semi-white mushroom
Another popular recipe for semi-white mushroom is frying. In a hot frying pan greased with vegetable oil, fry 200 g of chopped onions until transparent.
After that, pre-boiled and chopped semi-white mushrooms are added to the onion, after 10 minutes, salt and pepper the mixture to taste, and after another quarter of an hour they are removed from the stove. Fried boletus can be served with boiled potatoes, porridge and other dishes.
Conclusion
A semi-white mushroom is a fairly tasty edible mushroom that requires minimal processing. If you properly study his description and photos and correctly recognize him in the forest, he will be able to decorate many culinary dishes.
