Taste West Sweden

We’re delighted to announce that full details of our new two night autumn package, Taste West Sweden, are now on on the website. We love the area so much and are sure you will too so we’re offering a fully inclusive two night holiday in our lovely summerhouses on the island of Orust. You’ll enjoy a visit to our local sheep farm, a mussel expedition out onto the fjord to collect your own dinner, and a funghi foray with us in the beautiful surrounding woods. The focus will be on good food proudly made with local ingredients, some of which you’ve harvested yourselves!

As each house sleeps 3 – 4 it’s an ideal trip for couples, families, or groups of friends, and can be booked as a stand alone package or part of a longer holiday in Sweden. You’ll find plenty to inspire you on the Visit West Sweden site and you can always ask us about our favourites and recommendations.  There are weekend and midweek dates available throughout September and plenty of convenient flights to Gothenburg with Ryanair, SAS, Norwegian and Easyjet from London, Manchester & Edinburgh. Book Taste West Sweden via the Contact page. We’re happy to chat with you about the holiday so do give us a ring.

Mer info på svenska finns här: Västsverige/Södra Bohuslän 

UK Funghi Forays 2014

If you can’t get to Sweden then why not come out on a foray with us in the UK? You’ll find more information, prices and a list of dates on the UK Funghi Forays page.

Tastings coming up…

We’ve also got a couple of tastings coming up soon. If you’re in Chorlton in South Manchester on Saturday 15th March come and see us at Barbakan Delicatessen where we’ll be serving tasty Winter Chanterelle toasties  from 11am – 1pm, and a few weeks later  on Thursday 27th March we’ll be at 8th Day in Manchester once again, serving wild mushroom toasties from 11.30 – 2.30.

Buy our wild mushrooms online!

Last but not least, we’re delighted that our friends at Scandinavian Kitchen on Great Titchfield St in London are not just selling Get Funghi mushrooms in their deli-cafe but also in their online shop, with nationwide distribution in the UK. Fantastic news for those of you not near any of our other stockists!

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You probably think that there won’t be any mushrooms around to pick at this time of year. There aren’t many, it’s true, but a lovely tasty specimen that grows all year round is of course the Oyster Mushroom (Pleurotus Ostreatus). It’s a species that can be cultivated so you’ll find them in the supermarket, but they do grow wild so keep your eyes peeled. We found some beauties growing on a dead tree not long ago, and they were delicious with breakfast the next day. You’ll find a recipe for Mediterranean Oyster Mushrooms on our site and if you want more inspiration here’s a link to BBC Food, and some excellent dried wild mushroom recipes by the wonderful Nigel Slater.

We’ll be making some changes to the format of our Gather & Cook weekends in West Sweden this year – more information to follow shortly – and we should have finalised the dates for those trips and our popular Fungus Forays in the Peak District in the autumn by the end of next week. Watch this space!

It’s been nice to have a little time to experiment with a couple of new recipes now that the picking season is over. We were inspired by a lady we met last weekend who told us about one of her favourite wild mushroom recipes given to her by a French friend. This simple recipe contained chestnuts, always such a nice ingredient to use around Christmas, and we’re very grateful to her for telling us because the combination of wild ceps with chestnuts is truly a match made in heaven!

First up is Ceps with chestnuts and thyme. This is such a delicious dish that we ate it as it was straight out of the pan! It would make a fantastic addition as a side dish to the Christmas dinner or served as a quick and easy lunch with a good crusty bread.

Alternatively if you want a spectacular soup for a special dinner party we can highly recommend our Porcini & Chestnut soup. Rich, creamy and warming, with a touch of brandy, this soup definitely has the wow factor.

Full instructions to make both dishes can be found on our wild mushroom recipes page. Bon appetit!

It’s going to be a lively morning at Barbakan Deli on Manchester Rd in Chorlton-cum-Hardy this Saturday 14 December. We’ll be serving Winter Chanterelle toasties to folk queuing up to be served at one of South Manchester’s busiest delis and there’ll be a skiffle band playing outside at the same time. It seems a very appropriate way to celebrate the season and end the year, on a high note, literally! Come and see us there between 11am and 1pm. We’ll be travelling to Sweden for Christmas the week after so we wish you all

God Jul och Gott Nytt År! 

We’re running a competition to win two packets of mushrooms of your choice and a beautiful hand turned juniper spatula made in Sweden by Erik Sved. To enter go to Get Funghi’s Facebook page and simply like the photo. A winner will be picked at random and announced on Monday and we’ll be running the competition again next Friday so you can let all your friends know and have another go yourself!

Our friends at Marple Bridge’s lovely deli/cafe, Dutsons rolled out their new winter lunch menu last week, and we’re really pleased to announce that they are using our dried Winter Chanterelles for one of the dishes in the pate selection. Needless to say we got ourselves down there pretty promptly to try it and were duly impressed. The Winter Chanterelle Rillette, a rich and creamy wild mushroom pate topped with chive butter, was served with a little home made pickled salad and very pretty green and purple dressed leaves, with a generous portion of toasted hand cut bread. Beautifully presented and very delicious! Another member of our party tried their Pulled Pork and declared it to be equally delicious. It’s the kind of menu that leaves you spoilt for choice and I imagine we’ll be going back soon to try another dish or two. What a great combination – a well stocked deli/cafe run by two enthusiastic and knowledgeable brothers (their wine recommendations are always spot on!), with a talented young chef in the kitchen. Lucky Marple Bridge!

We’re so looking forward to next Saturday, 7th December. We run a twice yearly Art & Craft Show called Made in New Mills which celebrates the fantastic work that is created by the many talented artists and craftspeople based in and around our great North Derbyshire home town, and run a Swedish themed cafe on the day. There’ll be wild mushroom toasties galore plus homemade cakes, mulled wine, fairtrade hot drinks, home made elderflower cordial, cheese toasties and Swedish meatball muffins!

Included in the list of exhibitors this year will be printmaker Lucy Gell, artists Paul Gent & Andrea Joseph, hand made soaps and other products by Hayfield Holistics, plus a glittering array of exquisite hand made jewellery, textiles & hand knitting, photography, ceramics, candles, jams & Christmas Wreaths. Make your Christmas presents unique and original this year!

We will be making our very moreish Winter Chanterelle mushroom toasties to give away at New Mills’s finest fruit, veg and other delicacies emporium, Doc Greens on Union Rd next Saturday 30th November between 10am and 1pm. Make sure you stay around in the town for the Christmas Lights switch on, fair and festivities starting at 6pm!

It’s been a strange mushroom season this year. Even now after a good dose of rain we’re having to walk further and look harder than previous years to find Winter Chanterelles, which normally grow in profusion in Sweden’s densely forested landscape. As you can see from the photo these autumn/winter mushrooms can be hard to spot among the undergrowth at this time of year, but it’s worth the effort to get out there in the wild woods and try and find them where it’s wettest, in the mossy spots for instance.

And when you do go out in the woods with your handy mushroom knife and a basket to collect in make sure you follow our number one top tip:

Clean your mushrooms where you find them (unless you’re taking them home to identify) before you put them in the basket. Cut the bottom of the stalk off and remove any pine needles or moss. If you chuck them all in together without doing this then all of them will be dirty by the time you get home!

We’ll be back at On the Eighth Day, Manchester’s oldest and still best vegetarian cafe and wholefood cooperative next Thursday 7th November. Do come over for a taste of our wild mushrooms and funghi related chat between 11am and 2pm. Hope to see you there!