Beefsteak Fungus! 🥩🍄 AKA Ox-Tounge Fungus! 🐂👅🍄
What an incredible specimen of mushroom we have here! This guy looks just like raw meat after being sliced open and allowing for oxidation to happen, which is when the flesh of the mushroom will come into contact with the air and bruise a deep dark red. It will also bleed a red blood like liquid. It’s an ideal mushroom for the novice forager to look for as there are no poisonous mushrooms that look anything like it in the UK.
Beefsteak fungus is absolutely jam packed with medicinal quality’s too! It acts as a free-radical scavenging agent with it’s high antioxidant content. It’s also antibacterial and has been found to be anti tumour. It also contains more protein than actual beef!
Beefsteak mushrooms grow in late summer and early autumn and they thrive in the damp aftermath of rainfall. They can grow individually or in groups, and they tend to grow sweet chestnut and oak.
This mushroom can be eaten raw or cooked. It has an acquired taste and is a little acidic. Not personally one of my favourites in taste but I eat many of them at this time of year (August/September) for the joy and health benefits of them!
Scientific name: Fistulina hepatica
Happy foraging!