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Stropharia blue-green is an interesting mushroom with weak poisonous properties, which, nevertheless, is allowed to be eaten. In order for stropharia to be safe, it is important to be able to distinguish it from similar species and cook it correctly.
Description of blue-green stropharia
Photos and descriptions of blue-green stropharia make it easy to recognize it in the forest. The mushroom, which is also called copperhead troishling yar, has characteristic external features and a bright color.
Cap Description
The cap of the troishling is wide-shaped, reaches a diameter of 3 to 12 cm. In the photo of the blue-green stropharia mushroom, it can be seen that in young fruiting bodies the shade of the cap is closer to bluish-green, and the skin is covered with a slimy film. As the cap dries up, yellow and brownish spots appear on it.
You can recognize young mushrooms by a clear tubercle in the center of the cap and by the remains of the bedspread at the edges. The plates on the cap are gray-green in color, with age they become dark brown or even lilac, and the edges of the hymenophore remain white.
Description of the leg
The leg of the blue-green stropharia reaches 12 cm in height and 2 cm in girth. The structure is slippery, scaly or hairy, sometimes with a preserved ring. The color of the leg is pale greenish or pale bluish, almost the same shade as the hat.
Where and how to grow
You can usually meet blue-green stropharia on the wood of dead trees, on stumps and fallen trunks, on spruce, pine and fir wood, less often it grows on deciduous trees. The fungus is common in all areas with a temperate climate, it appears mainly closer to autumn – from late August to mid-October. You can meet him in the Moscow region and in Siberia, in the Far East and in the southern regions.
Usually copperhead troishling grows in groups or dense bunches, it is rare to see single fruiting bodies.
Edible blue-green stropharia or not
Different sources hold their own opinions regarding the edibility of this variety. The pulp contains a dangerous acid with a narcotic effect, which is part of opium. However, in general, the mushroom is considered edible, although slightly poisonous, with hallucinogenic properties.
It is impossible to use troyshling yar copperhead in its raw form, this will harm health. However, after boiling, the main part of the hazardous substances from the pulp leaves, and the stropharia becomes suitable for food use.
How to cook blue-green stropharia
The slightly poisonous and hallucinogenic blue-green stropharia mushroom needs especially careful processing before eating. If you neglect the preparation, then not only food poisoning will come, but also severe mental consequences. A large amount of troishling eaten can have the same effect on the body as a strong drug with a hallucinogenic effect.
Mushroom preparation
When processing blue-green fruiting bodies, it is important to remove the thin skin from the hats, it is in it that the concentration of harmful substances is highest. The skin is peeled off easily, about the same as butter.
Peeled fruit bodies must be placed in a deep saucepan with salted water and boiled for at least 15 minutes. After that, the hats are thrown into a colander, and the broth is drained – it is unsuitable for use in food.
How to pickle blue-green stropharia
Properly cleaned and boiled mushroom is suitable for further pickling. The recipe for marinating troishling is as follows:
- pour water and 100 ml of table vinegar into a deep saucepan;
- add 1 large spoon of salt and bring the water to a boil;
- 1 kg of prepared stropharia is placed in the solution.
When the fruiting bodies start up the juice, and foam appears on the surface of the water, it will need to be removed. Stropharia are boiled in water and vinegar for 15 minutes, then put in the marinade 1 small spoonful of sugar, a few peas of allspice, a little cloves and cinnamon. You can also add bay leaf or star anise to taste.
The marinade is boiled for another 10 minutes, and then removed from the stove and poured hot into sterilized jars. After the blanks have cooled under a warm blanket, they can be put in the refrigerator for further storage.
Salting stropharia blue-green
The description of the use of blue-green stropharia offers another recipe – cold salting of troishling.
For cooking you will need:
- cut large caps of boiled mushrooms into small pieces, and leave small ones whole;
- put stropharia in a jar in layers of 6-10 cm, alternating each of the layers with a large amount of salt;
- add garlic and other aromatic spices to taste along with salt;
- alternate salt and mushrooms until the jar is filled to the top.
After that, the neck of the container is closed with thick gauze and a heavy load is placed on top. In a couple of days, the stropharia in the jar will release juice abundantly, and in total it will take 30-40 days for salting. During this time, the gauze on the neck of the jar will need to be changed regularly so that mold does not appear on it.
Limitations and contraindications
Since the blue-green stropharia Stropharia Aeruginosa has a hallucinogenic effect on the body, it should be consumed in very small quantities even after careful processing. With an overdose of troishlings, nervous overexcitation is observed, hallucinations occur – visions that can last several hours in time. In general, the effect of blue-green stropharia on the body during an overdose is similar to the effect of the drug LSD and leads to paranoia, delirium, anxiety and euphoria.
It is forbidden to use troishling on an empty stomach or in a weakened state, in which case the toxins will have a stronger effect. The mushroom is absolutely contraindicated for people suffering from mental disorders, it is absolutely forbidden to use it for women in position, young children and adolescents up to adulthood.
Also, blue-green stropharia has quite typical contraindications for mushrooms. It is better not to eat it with sluggish digestion and a tendency to constipation, since mushroom pulp is digested with difficulty. It is better to refuse the product during exacerbation of chronic gastric diseases.
Twins and their differences
Despite the recognizable appearance and photo of the blue-green stropharia, it can be confused with some other mushrooms. Troyshling twins are mostly conditionally edible, suitable for food use after processing.
sky blue stropharia
Mushrooms belong to the same genus and therefore are similar to each other. But the sky-blue stropharia has a more saturated blue tint with small ocher spots. In addition, the cap of the blue variety is usually flattened in adulthood, while that of the blue-green variety more often retains a conical shape.
Unlike troishling, blue stropharia does not grow on dead tree wood, but in parks and pastures, on roadsides and in other places with fertile soil. The mushroom is considered edible, but due to its unusual appearance, it is rarely used in cooking.
crowned stropharia
This variety is very reminiscent of blue-green in size and shape, the cap of the crowned species is also conical, with fragments of the bedspread along the edges. But you can distinguish the species by color – crowned stropharia has a yellowish, ocher, beige or lemon tint.
Eating a mushroom is not accepted, it is little studied, and various sources classify it as conditionally edible or unequivocally poisonous.
Interesting facts about blue-green stropharia
The unusual troyshling verdigris looks very beautiful, but because of its shape and color, it is perceived by mushroom pickers with apprehension. Although the harmful properties of troishling are reduced with proper processing, most people avoid using it in food.
Other interesting facts are associated with blue-green stropharia:
- Even in ancient times, troishling and similar species were used for religious rituals – hallucinogenic properties helped priests and shamans enter a state of special ecstasy.
- Currently, information on the edibility of stropharia in different countries is different. In Europe, it is simply considered tasteless, and in America it is classified as poisonous.
It is curious that a large number of dead insects in a semi-decomposed state can often be seen on the slimy cap of a troishling. There is a version that the mucus on the hat helps to digest the bodies of flies and mosquitoes, but this has not yet been proven for sure.
Conclusion
Blue-green stropharia is a legal, but potentially dangerous mushroom. Before use in food, it must be carefully processed in order to neutralize the possible harm.
