Morels?  Cèpes? Too early for Girolles – but let’s be on the lookout anyway: May is mushroom time.  Maybe your “woods” are in Michigan, in Minnesota, or just over the line in northern Iowa.  Or perhaps your sturdy mushroom-walking stick is poking through a ferny forest floor in the Périgord – where  every hunter needs a good “mushrooming stick”.  The Périgord’s brief morel season has slipped past, usually a fleeting moment late in March. One year I spotted three fine morels under our pear tree about that time, but no such luck this time around.  So, when friends brought us a fern-lined basket of cèpes this week, the mushroom-loving vagabond was delighted.

Get out the black cast-iron skillet, the mushroom season is underway! Whether you call them cèpes,  porcini or boletus edulis, a healthy dose of garlic, parsley, and duck fat are the traditional partners for enhancing their earthy flavor.  To keep them fresh for a few hours before cooking, wrap them in ferns and avoid contact with plastic.  The first step in preparing cèpes is simply to wipe off the cap and stem, then chop the stem and mix it with minced garlic and chopped (flat-leaf) parsley in a bowl to add later. Peel and slice rounds of firm, red-skinned potatoes (ratio of at least 1 cup  sliced spuds for each mushroom). Heat 2 tablespoons of duck fat (or olive oil) in your good old skillet, and add the sliced potatoes, stir to turn them over and as some crisp and become transparent, add the cèpes – left whole if small, in slices if large. Then, don’t be surprised if the mushrooms seem to dissolve, melting with the heat, infusing the pototoes with flavor. Add the chopped stems with garlic and stir the mixture, lower the heat and cover, to cook for 20 to 30 minutes. Check at least 3 times, turning so nothing sticks and burns, a little more oil or duck fat is usually needed.  Sprinkle with more chopped parsley and serve with a green salad tossed with a lemon vinaigrette dressing. Other than a cold beer or a glass of white wine, you’ll need only good company to complete a perfect spring lunch.