Agaric Ketchup.—Place agarics of as large a size as you can procure, but which are not worm-eaten, layer by layer, in a deep pan, sprinkling each layer as it is put in with a little salt. The next day stir them well up several times, so as to mash and extract their juice. On the third day strain off the liquor, measure, and boil for ten minutes, and then to every pint of the liquor add half an ounce of black pepper, a quarter of an ounce of bruised ginger-root, a blade of mace, a clove or two, and a tea-spoonful of mustard-seed. Boil again for half an hour; put in two or three bay leaves, and set aside till quite cold. Pass through a strainer, and bottle; cork well, and dip the ends in resin. A very little Chili vinegar is an improvement, and some add a glass of port wine, or a glass of strong ale to every bottle.
Care should be taken that the spice is not added so abundantly as to overpower the true flavour of the agaric. A careful cook will keep back a little of the simple boiled liquor to guard against this danger: a good one will always avoid it. “Doctors weigh their things,” said a capital cook, “but I go by taste.” But then, like poets, good cooks of this order must be born so; they are not to be made.
Coprinus comatus (the Maned Agaric).
Pileus cylindrical, obtuse, campanulate, fleshy in the centre, but very thin towards the margin. The external surface soon torn up into fleecy scales, with the exception of a cap at the top. Gills free, linear, and crowded. Quite white when young, becoming rose-coloured, sepia, and then black, from the margin upwards. They then expand quickly, curl up in shreds, and deliquesce into a black inky fluid which stains the ground. Stem of a pure white, four to five inches high, contracting at the top, and bulbous at the base; hollow, fibrillose, stuffed with a light cottony web. The bulb is solid and rooting, the ring is movable.
This very elegant agaric has also been called Ag. cylindricus, Schœff; Ag. typhoides, Bull; and Ag. fimetarius, Bolt. It is common throughout the summer and autumn months, on road-sides, pastures, and waste places. It is extremely variable in size. Its general appearance is so distinct and striking, that it cannot possibly be mistaken for any other agaric. It grows so abundantly on waste ground in the dwellings and farm-yards that it may be, says Dr. Bull, called the “agaric of civilization;” and for both these reasons it is most valuable as an edible agaric. If its merits were known, it would be eaten as freely as the common field mushroom.
“The maned mushrooms,” Miss Plues has well said, “grow in dense clusters, each young plant like an attenuated egg, white and smooth. Presently some exceed the others in rapidity of growth, and their heads get above the ground, the stem elongates rapidly, the ring falls loosely round the stem, the margin of the pileus enlarges, and the oval head assumes a bell-shape; then a faint tint of brown spreads universally or in blotches over the upper part of the pileus, and the whiteness of its gills changes to a dull pink. A few more hours and the even head of the pileus has split in a dozen places, the sections curl back, melt out of all form into an inky fluid, and on the morrow’s dawn a black stain on the ground will be all that remains. And so on with the others in succession.”
Opinions on the Merits of Coprinus comatus as an Edible Fungus.—“Esculent when young.”—Berkeley.
“Young specimens should be selected.”—Badham.