Morels of the story

Wallowa County is in the midst of a mushroom frenzy. Servers in Hermiston crashed over the weekend due to all the Facebook posts bragging about poundage of mushrooms. You can do a census count of how many kitchen sinks there are in northeast Oregon right now because every one of them is online brimming with morels. Cows are sore from producing enough milk to make enough butter to saute’ all these shrooms. It’s madness. Whoever the governor of Oregon is these days had to declare a state of deliciousness.

Captain Morgan Jenkins has always been on the All-Star squad of morel hunters, and the convergence of all this rain and mushroom growing factors has put Mojo into high gear. I mean, look at this. I’m afraid his kitchen floor is going to collapse. I asked him where he found these and he said St. Louis.

Cap’n Todd and his lovely wife Tammy have also been chopping down huge morels. It’s not just abundance recently, it’s that these things are swelling to almost indecent proportions. Todd and Tammy had to use a cross-cut misery whip saw to fell this one.

If you don’t have a kitchen sink, Olaf pottery is the next best vessel for displaying morels. Or maybe the other way around. If you don’t have Olaf pottery, call a carpenter and have a new shelf built in your kitchen because you’re going to be starting a collection. These ceramic wonder vessels are very Wallowa County, very awesome, made by a very awesome guy from Wallowa County. Here’s a link. Folgers crystals taste just like fine espresso when sipped from a Juve mug.

I don’t know what’s going on with this golden age of fungus right now, but I ain’t complaining. If we’re lucky, Morgan will preserve some of that bounty and slip some into the sauce for pasta night or into the skillet on farm-fresh egg morning . . . although that would elevate the already skyrocketingly-good Winding Waters meals into zero gravity and there’s not much research available on that. Maybe we can ask the instructors on the Wilderness Advanced Life Support trip in Hells Canyon in September what the taste bud threshold is for goodness.

Meantime, peace out, y’all.

(photos and mushrooms courtesty of Tammy. Except that sink one. That’s all Mojo.)