Mushroom foraging tour run by the String and Salt cooking school in Warragul Victoria, hosted by Michelle and Mel and an honorable mention and thanks to Dave who cooked up a great meal.


We started by meeting at the Streatside Cafe and Eatery for complimentary coffees and headed off to 4 or 5 different properties looking at many of the edible and not so edible mushrooms of the Gippsland area.


We were supplied with a 12 page handout covering code of practice, parts of a mushroom, shapes of the caps and stems, gills , pores and spines. We received an explanation of taking spore prints and tips in identifying edible from toxic and not so edible fungi.


We covered Pine Mushrooms, Field Mushrooms, Slippery Jacks and Slippery Jills, Birch Bolete, Shaggy Mane, Shiny Cap, as well as the poisonous species of Death cap, Yellow Staining Mushrooms and fly Agaric.


A great six hours, good company, good conversations and detailed instruction. We ended the day with a luncheon in the hills prepared by Dave of Wild Mushroom Stroganoff, Polenta and a Foraged Green Salad with a glass of wine around a fire. The best part South Australian Beer. Cant go past a Coopers Pale.


I probably should have been taking notes throughout but it was one of those days I just decided to enjoy the experience. Well worth doing a great day out. I came away with a great deal of knowledge and at-least I can now tell what a Death Cap looks like.

class looking under birch tress
fly agaric
laughing jins
spore samples
spore sample of a death cap
Leucoagaricus leucothites
some of the landscape
looking out from the mushroom paddock
whole paddock was full
mount worth
the cook out
its traditional yourve got to have a fire to have a beer around
mount worth
explaining our foraged green salad, I may never buy lettuce again
great food, I almost ate it before taking a picture. had to have seconds
some of the different species we collected

Needles grow in clusters of 2,3 and 5. Pines with clusters of 2 are red pines, pines with clusters of 3 are yellow pines. Pines with clusters of 5 are white pines.

Im placing this here because on the day I could not remember which was which. Saffron milk caps only grow under Yellow Pines.

death cap avoid white gills