Hen-of-the-wood(s) mushrooms don’t grow everywhere – this one and the others pictured here were grown in Massachusetts. They’re delicious if you didn’t know . . .
We have a very dear friend, Joe Casali, who comes to stay with us regularly when he’s calling on customers in our area. He’s great fun to have around, and I usually cook a nice dinner when he’s here. Joe enjoys good food (and he and Dave are always chit-chatting about wine, which is an important part of every evening meal, but particularly so when Joe is here). This time he brought a gorgeous bottle of 1995 Markham Cabernet and a package of his mushrooms, and there’s quite a story here. My DH and Joe go sailing together often on our boat in San Diego, sometimes with Joe’s wife Yvette too (I don’t go because I get seasick). Joe and Dave were once in business together, decades ago, and they roomed together back in the late 1970s for awhile. Both were jolly bachelors at the time.
Joe is Italian. Very Italian. He grew up in Massachusetts. His grandparents came over from the old country in the early 1900s and settled in Springfield, Mass., in the Italian district there, then later to East Longmeadow. Growing up in the 1950s Joe watched his grandmother Paulina and his mother Viola as they cooked food from their region in Italy – Emilia-Romagna. The family was from Piacenza (actually the town of Morfasso, in the mountains nearby) where the town is mostly made up of Casalis and Rigolis. It was at his Grandmother Paulina’s knee that he learned all about the mushrooms. Hen-of-the-wood is a Grifola frondosa polypore mushroom if you’re interested in the etymology. Over time in Joe’s family the mushroom name got kind of scrambled, and they call them grafoni.
Sometimes, apparently, in the East, in October, you can buy these mushrooms at Whole Foods. The last time Joe knew, they were charging $40/pound for them. See why they’re prized? – except that most people don’t know that much about them.
Hen-of-the-woods mushrooms are both revered and reviled (the latter only because some don’t know what a delicacy they really are and because some view them as eyesores in their pristine yards). If you go online and do a search for the mushrooms and click on images, you’ll find hundreds of pictures of them in all their delicate glory, nestled on or at the base of big trees, mostly oaks. Joe doesn’t know if these mushrooms also grow in the region of his family in Italy, but for 
sure these immigrants learned to use them in Massachusetts. For years Joe has been flying to Mass. every September or October, to harvest hundreds and hundreds of pounds of these amazing mushrooms. Joe borrows a friend’s car and heads out to hunt mushrooms. Joe has an Excel spreadsheet that he’s developed over the years of locations of these mushrooms (because they grow in the same place year after year – he showed it to me awhile back – he has notes about taking this footpath, go 50 feet to this tree, cross the stream, turn left, etc.). He’s made friends with a few people within a 20-30 mile radius of his family home there and they leave the mushrooms intact waiting for Joe’s trip to harvest. Most of them are in forests and glades, or a vacant lot studded with trees. Joe’s dad knew the locations of these mushrooms and over the years Joe has found more and more of them.
Joe’s father was a member of an an Italian club – a club that actually still has a clubhouse. Can you tell there is a strong Italian population there? Joe is allowed to use the kitchen (he’s a member in good standing, though he only goes there once a year) to fix his mushrooms. Joe hardly 
sleeps during this several day period – he harvests a trunk full of them, goes to the clubhouse and starts cooking and cooks late into the night. Then the next day he goes out for more and repeats. He has a freezer there, too, that is used for his mushroom harvest. When he’s done he packs the frozen plastic containers in dry ice in a couple of big ice chests and flies home with his mushroom haul to California. One year he prepared 61 quart containers of cooked mushrooms.
There’s Joe with the 17-pounder. He ever so carefully cleans and slices them. The center is also used completely. He cooks them in individual batches. Joe has kindly given me the recipe he uses.
The other night he brought one container from his last harvest – it’s enough to feed about 8 people. Dinner was steak, sweet potatoes, these mushrooms, green salad, and some of that wonderful Dario’s Olive Oil Cake for dessert.
The sauce – well, it’s simple enough to make. Joe carefully cleans, trims and cuts the mushrooms into jillions of pieces. He sautés garlic and onions, then adds all the mushrooms, then canned Roma tomatoes with a little bit of juice. It’s seasoned with lots of fresh basil (that he quick dry roasts in the oven) added in just at the end of cooking. The mushrooms aren’t swimming in sauce – the minimal amount of canned tomatoes are there just to flavor them. They’re packed up in containers almost dry, but not quite. Above you can see there is some liquid – but very, very little. You reheat them over very low heat and serve as a side dish. Thank you, Joe, for sharing the story and the recipe. I hope your mother and grandmother would be proud!
What’s GOOD: harvesting your own food of any kind is cool. I can’t take credit for any of that. Joe did all the work. The mushrooms are very tasty – chewy, but not overly so. The sauce is not overwhelming at all – what is there is flavoring only. It’s all about the mushrooms, for sure.
What’s NOT: well, since we don’t live in an area to get these, too bad for us! We’ll have to rely on our friend Joe to bring us one of his precious stock.
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Casali Family Italian Mushrooms
Recipe By: Our friend Joe Casali’s family recipe, from his Grandmother Paulina.
Serving Size: 8
7 cups hen-of-the-wood mushrooms — * see instructions below
6 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon fresh garlic — minced
2 medium onions — halved, sliced thinly
1 cup canned tomatoes — Roma variety, crushed by hand, drained (about 5+)
1/4 cup tomato juice — from the canned tomatoes
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
2 cups fresh basil — left whole
MUSHROOMS: Clean all dirt, bug areas, wormy areas off the base. Soak the mushroom(s) in warm salted water (warm water removes more of the dirt than cold water). Roll the mushroom under water so you remove as much dirt and debris as possible. Drain and refill the tub at least twice, repeating the process. If you’re doing many, wear rubber gloves. Gently drain mushroom and dry somewhat with paper towels. Cut mushroom into quarters, then you start pulling the pieces off, including all of the center stem portion. Some of it is cut, and parts are gently pulled to remove small ribbon-like shreds about 3 inches long and 1 inch wide or so. It takes patience.
1. Bring a large pot of water to a boil and add salt. Place mushrooms (already cleaned and sliced) in the water and simmer for about 7-9 minutes. Drain in a colander and set aside.
2. In a very large skillet heat olive oil. Add garlic and saute over low-medium heat (do not burn) until golden. Add onion and continue cooking until onion is golden brown also. Add the mushrooms and cook for about 10 minutes over medium heat. You want the onions to get a dark golden brown.
3. Add canned Roma tomatoes, crushed in your hand (remove center core and discard), and continue cooking over medium heat until the mushrooms are almost brown, another 5-10 minutes. Add 1/4 cup of the canned juices, and even more if the mushrooms start to burn. Taste mushrooms and continue to cook until they’re tender. They will never been quite SOFT, but they’ll be chewy and cooked through. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
4. Pour mushroom mixture into a colander and drain off the oil.
5. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 200° F. Snip off the stems on all the basil, then place on a large baking sheet and roast for about 7-8 minutes – only until the basil has dried and turned slightly brown. Remove immediately and set aside.
6. Using your hands, crush the basil (it will be almost like dust) between your palms and add all of it to the mushroom mixture and stir until combined. You may serve the mushrooms at this point, or pour them into freezer containers and freeze. Once defrosted, reheat gently over low heat until hot and serve along side grilled meat, poultry, pork, sausages.
Per Serving: 127 Calories; 11g Fat (70.6% calories from fat); 2g Protein; 8g Carbohydrate; 2g Dietary Fiber; 0mg Cholesterol; 76mg Sodium.
jan
said on February 17th, 2014:
Love those Mushrooms!!
jan