More Shrooms!!!

Well its been raining and humid most of the time that ive had off lately which means its been perfect conditions for mushroom hunting and this week ive been out a couple of times again once with Brendan and once by myself when i couldnt sit around at home anymore. 

When Brendan and I went out we were very suprised with what we found, although at first we were not sure what exactly we would be picking we soon found and identified a whole bunch of Red crackling bolete which is very similar to the slippery jacks we get back home however they have a red stem and start to crack on the caps when they get older. Unfortuantly due to the rain the majority of them were to wet to pick but we did manage to find some very nice smaller ones hiding in the forrest floor.

After a while of searching for these and meeting anothe guy who had been picking and had some of the biggest Cep type mushrooms ive ever seen we decided to move on and head over to a spot where weve picked chanterelles before, on the way we came across a bunch of these small Cep type mushrooms which had us jumping in excitement and throwing hi fives as we picked about a kilo of them. I even found one of the biggest boletes ive ever picked, even though after identifying it as the Bitter Bolete which is unedible due to its bitter taste i wanted to take it home and try it for myself.

That nite i decided to cook them up but first tried a small piece of each, the Bitter Bolete was exactly as described in the book and toatly unedible while the red crackling once fullly cleaned and the other small ceps were delicious.

So i went with them and planned to simply fry them with butter to go on top of a rissoto.

Everything was going to plan until i tasted the fried mushrooms and was overwhelmed by a bitter taste which as i later found out was thanks to me miss identifying a couple of small Bitter Boletes as Ceps and therefore almost destroying our dinner, which as sophia read later was a common mistake as the grow with the Ceps and when small are very simmilar in look and smell however if tasted when picked have a very unpleasnt bitter taste.

Needless to say as one of the most importatnt rules when picking mushrooms is to make sure you can properly identify what it is that your picking and in our excitement we had failed to do just this but it wont happen again. Oh yeah and we got a 750 kr train fine for having out of date tickets on a sunday nite which added to the learning experience´s of the day. 

 One of the Red Crackling Bolete´s we found

 The small Bitter Bolete

 Some type of Stinkhorn. Apparently this was eaten as a aphrodesiac a while ago. Looks like a Cock hahahaha

 The big Bitter Bolete even the bugs dont like these ones.

 Dinner which was almost ruined. We managed to save the Red Boletes and a few Chanterelles.

DAY 2

The second day i went on my own was very good and although i didnt get as many mushrooms the quality was much better. This time i noticed that all the Red Crackling Boletes were completly gone even though it was only three days later but as i walked into the next part of the forest i managed to identify another nicer type of Bolete the Bay Bolete and although i didnt find many of these they were very tasty just simply fried and eaten on toast with some herbs from our own herb planter were amazing.

Also i found another massive Bitter Bolete of which i only took a photo but still a very impressive mushroom.

 

Heres a nice Bay Bolete they were all in very good condition that day.

 The monster Bitter Bolete with my knife for scale

   
And the end result a good colection of Bay Boletes with some very small Chanterelles to go with.

All in all it was a good few days of picking and alot of learning was done and as the weather remains waarm and raining i cant wait to see whats out there next week.

Keeping busy

Well since ive been on holidays its been kinda hard to keep busy doing things that dont cost too much cash, as everyone has probably heard me bitch about it being expensive here and the whole working for free thing isnt realy helping my cause. So its been alot of catching up on movies, TV, mushroom picking, skating (now on a new board and wheels which is nice) and the newest of the not so expensive hobbies if fishing.

Fishing has been something that has kind of been lost to me in the last few years with all the travelling thats been going on and after looking into it and seeing pictures of all the big fish that get caught around here i decided to buy a cheap rod, some hooks and get back into it.

Denmark seems like a realy great place to fish with lots of possibilities for all types of fishing within an hour of copenhagen most acessable by public transport which is good.

It didnt take much convincing or time to get Brendan excited about the whole idea and he also got some gear and on tuesday we were off on the first copenhagen fishing trip even if it was only to the coast right near the main ports only a 30 min bike ride from home. It turned out to be a pretty amazing place with the sea on one side and vacant fields with a industrial buildings in the background on the other side, and we wernt the only ones who were there which i felt was good sign and Brendan to was as keen as ive ever seen anyone to catch dinner. In the end we spent about 8 hrs out there on the rocks in the sun only to Brendan loose a good sized fish in the rocks, land another no bigger than his lure and watch everyone else around us catch fish but i guess thats the way it goes sometimes and we will get them next time. So heres some pics i took of the day when i needed a break from all the hectic fishing that was being done..

 The ride in and the spot

 Brendan trying to figure out his new rod while the old boy next to us caught 3 fish in the first half hour he was there.

 This palce was getting knocked down by a wrecking ball.

 Somke stacks in the background

 This was the moment Brendan saw his dinner slip away

 While i set up and had lunch. Whats fishing without beer, cheese and biscuits

 

Someone getting up on this old fishing boat

 And some old bouys getting taged up.

So all in all it was a real nice chilled out day and i couldnt have thought of a better way to spend one of the few sunny days we´ve had here in the last weeks. Stay tuned for more stories about us trying to catch fish in copenhagen hopefully all the spots we find are as cool as this one.

Time off

Well its been about two and a half months since i started at noma and allthough it is not that log of a time i am so happy to have some time off now as the restaurant is closed for three week for summer holidays.

The time ive spent there so far has been amazing, hard, long, sometimes utterly frustrating but most of all super rewarding iv learnt so much in the short time ive been here and and can feel that with every little bit of new information i learn i am becoming a better cook for it, and i am very grateful for that.

Over the next three weeks expect to see a few more photos  and posts as i explore the city and surroundings a little more, also ive got a week stage at restaurant A.O.C which is a one michelin star here in copenhagen which will hopefully set me up with a paid job if im lucky as the copenhagen has defiantly left my pennyless at this point. Check the restaurant out here http://www.restaurantaoc.dk/

As for Noma posts heres a little something from last weeks projects the last of the season. For those of you who dont know projects are a creative session that happens every saturday nite after dinner service and pack down (usualy between 1 and 3 in the morning) which gives any of the chefs and stagiers a chance to make a dish with anything the want and have everyone taste it and give there opinion and ideas for improvement, It is very rewarding to be a part of this and hear such experienced chefs talk about food and ideas the way that they do, so enjoy.

My friend James was very brave and presented three very delicious types of cherry tomatoes which he had grown from seed in his apartment balcony less than 1km from the restaurant therefore making something which is not normaly considerd as danish produce very much danish.

 Here Oliver creates chanterelles in there environment with moss and beach nuts. And in the process without knowing taking my idea which i had set aside for my project, back to the drawing board i guess.

 Ryan a stagier from canada makes peach textures with verbena ice cream and chilli granita, very nice and pretty aswell

 Carol the pastry chef di partie made Goats milk mousse with cherrys  and louvage.

This one was amazing and had Rene calling it a masterpiece

 And finaly another stagier Giles with a interpretation of his smell memory from a farm he used to work at.

Fermentated apples with buckwheat beignets and served with fresh milk he brang with him from the uk.

Very nice dish

Well thats it for now hopefully soon i will get the balls up top do my project in front of everyone. I will be working on it over the break thats for sure.

One for Brad Hurley.. (Did Some One Say Mushrooms)

Last sunday something amazing happend, after a trip to ikea only to find it closed sophia and myself decided not to waste a day outside of copenhagen and went to check out a spot ive been looking at for some time now just waiting for the first sight of any sort of mushroom activity. After seeing some chanterells at work and hearing that they were allready booming in sweden i thought it must be time to find some for myself.

When we arrived at the woods we were super stoked to find some fresh wild rasberries straight away which were amazing but as good as that was we still wanted the mushrooms and after about an hour or so we finally came across some of the smallest chanterells ive ever seen it was crazy that we even saw them at all popping there little yellow heads out from the moss. We didnt get many and with no camera i couldnt take pics my first spotted chanterelle but we did when we got home and heres the results of the sunday search. Not much but there was more to come.

So after being so uber stoked on our first discovery and proving to all the guys at work that said you cant pick here until september that you actually could i wanted more, So i went back out on monday and took Brendan out for his first outer copenhagen forraging mission. We headed back to the same spot and again walked for a hour or two only to find toadstools and other wild herbs that were interesting but still not what were there for, finally as it always seems to work out just as we were walking along the road back to the car with not not much faith left we stumbeld across another small patch and this time i had the camera ready so here we go.

So with our faith restored we continued on to another spot i wanted to check out but we didnt leave without some more of those deliciouse rasberries even if we had to pick them in the pouring rain.

 So we headed to the next spot and as soon as i got out of the car and walked a little bit i could feel we were in the spot it was steamy and smelt damp of mushrooms and within 15 minutes we were busting out high fives with what we had found.

 A couple of prime chanterelles and th days result not to shabby.

Needless to say we had a pretty nice dinner and dessert with Brendan and Tilde with what we had found which made the walking around in the rain and ticks well worth it.

Keep posted for more mushroom pics as this will be a regular thing from now on.

crazy weather

Another exciting week in copenhagen with crazy weather and lots of working yet again. Last saturday copenhagen got engulfed in one crazy storm which some believe had something to do with the mood at noma which after a hard day and a few fuck ups was stormy at best and right before dinner service the skys unleashed hell and we were stuck dealing with a flooded ground floor. The restaurant was ok and after running some diners across the car park with unbrellas in the middle of the lightning storm service still went smoothly but heres what we had to deal with http://www.twitvid.com/ZTYPX look out for the guy at the end with the mop on the right hand side loving life at the worlds best restaurant.