Moral Mushroom Festival, Mesick, Michigan

This weekend was the annual Mesick, Michigan morel mushroom festival. Foraging for morels is a Spring past time in this part of Michigan, but where to find the mushrooms is a fiercely guarded secret kept by the locals. It is a huge event with a carnival, parade, and the wierdest event, "The Blessing of the Jeeps". I'm not kidding.


You know this had to be the best 'shroomers party....


I was hipped on where to forage for the little bastards - go as far as I could down a seasonal snowmobile trail in Wexford County. I did, and the road was treacherous. I wasn't the only one who knew about this spot - there were whole families camped out in the woods in trailers and tents, spending days on end looking for morels. I looked for hours, and never found any of the elusive fungi. What I did find deep in the woods though were millions of trillium, the official flower of Ontario, and a species so delicate it is illegal to pick them


So I bought these beauties off of a sour faced, camo clad man in a pick-up who looked like Charles Bronson. He was parked at a gas station with a cardboard sign on his windshield that said MORELS. I bought half a pound off of him, and he gave them to me in a paper lunch bag. Everything about it was like a drug deal.


Dredge in a little flour and cornmeal, salt + pepper, and pan fry in butter. If you've never eaten one (and I hadn't before this weekend), believe the hype: morels are steaky and rich with a deep mushroom flavor, but aren't slimy or wet like portabellas or plain button mushrooms. That honeycomb of their crowns cook up with a unique texture - like tiny delicious sauce compartments. They are worth the effort.


I enjoyed them alongside a vegetarian pastie from Mr. Folsie's Pasties of Cadillac, Michigan. It was absolutely the best meal I've had since being up here. I wish you had been here to share it with me!