When I was a small kid, I’ve spent a lot of time in the country (three months a year at the least), so naturally I’m pretty much adapted now to live off the land. I always could get some food, be it a forest, a river, or even someone’s farm, while traveling in the countryside. Don’t get me wrong there was always plenty of food waiting for me at my grandparents’ home, but did it matter for an adventurous mind? In my early years I already knew how to get food, how to cook it to feed myself, and how to make a shelter for myself, if need be. So, after years spent in countryside I really know a lot about gifts of Mother Nature and how to use them.

Back than there were two things I was specially keen about–fishing and mushrooms hunting. Now, if you can go fishing almost without a mentoring or with a little knowledge about the matter, mushroom hunting requires a tuition for one extremely important reason–you can be poisoned by just too many mushrooms out there. For this reason, never believe any online mushroom hunting resources that asserts you can be a pro hunting mushrooms right after reading it. There are lots of mushroom hunting guides on the internets, but when describing hunting techniques these also should have a warning that at least 1% of all mushrooms can kill you and 20% can make you very sick.

Amanita muscaria (fly agaric or fly amanita), the most famous poisonous mushroom

No poisonous mushrooms look similar to penny bun (cep)!

I mostly live in the urban jungle now, but still love to travel through countryside. Once in while my friends (urban dwellers, who saw mushrooms mostly in the stores) join me for hunting mushrooms, which is always a great adventure for them. Needless to say, every time it’s also an event for me, because of many reasons. First, I love to spend my time with the friends, second walking in the forest is beneficial from any point of view, and it’s just always lots of fun to show your friends something new in this wonderful world.

A perfect looking penny bun (cep)

Yet another perfect penny bun!

My best advice is: if you are newbie in mushroom hunting never go hunting on your own and always have an experienced friend with you. Study how exactly edible mushrooms look like–that’s what all these online guides are pretty good at, but still not sufficient to stay safe. Pick only the mushrooms that you are 101% percent sure these are not poisonous.

These mushrooms are most delicious when small

Penny bun or cep is the best edible mushroom, don't even argue with me!

Personally when hunting for mushrooms, I’m always looking for the king of all mushrooms–the cep (penny bun, boletus edulis, porcino or porcini). I consider it the most tasty of all mushrooms and with additional tuition it’s pretty easy to recognize accurately when hunting. The pictures in this post should already give you an understanding of what mushrooms species I’m talking here, but since it has too many names over the globe, please also check with wikipedia.