FE520 Truffles and Allergies

[Alana McGee]

Just curious, have you heard of people with allergies to any truffle species?

There are a number of mushrooms where some people can eat them
with no problems and others where where many people are allergic (stomach cramps,
vomiting, diarrhea.

I have a problem with a normally ‘safe’ mushroom: chanterelles. I can have a small amount once every
week or two or I am sick.

[Alana McGee]

That is an excellent Question Annie and I am glad you brought it up!

There have not been any recorded reports of negative interaction with Tuber species truffles *which is what you basically will be hunting* (after all that is how they disperse is to be eaten by mammals), but as always with new mushroom species, you should try just a little bit before you go in Whole hog- and truffles are different than most mushrooms in the fact that they were evolved to be consumed by mammals as an evolutionary advantage, ourselves included. But some will not taste good to us.

Many other ?truffles’ are edible too, but there are some weird truffle-like fungi, like many scleroderma, that some cultures love and others those think cause gastric upset. Debate is still out, but those are NOT Tuber species. As far as we know, all Tuber species are safe. But if you find anything, we advise you to send a picture to either us or another expert. We need a picture of the outside, and well as a cross section. Helps if you can include other info like habitat too, but many truffles species, once you know what you are doing a bit are very easy to ID.

As for Chanterelles, have you ever had any of your chanty patches tested for toxic heavy metals? I know they are one of the species that accumulates them and was just chatting with some doing a study on this.

As for truffles, generally there should be no concern with true truffle species. That being said, we always advise caution. Just like other mushrooms, they can concentrate and hold on to pesticides or other gross things people may throw in their environment. That is what when harvesting off private sites you always want to know if the land owner is treating the trees/ shrubs/ ground with anything.

There have been extensive studies done on glyphosate concentration in truffle fruit bodies as it is used on many commercial orchards in Europe. The fruit bodies (aka the truffles) show no concentration of that chemical.

The GREAT thing about truffles is you don?t even have to EAT them to enjoy them. If you like they way they smell, you can infuse foods with their odor and enjoy them that way and never even have to consume the actual truffle itself! Truffles are basically all aroma 🙂

[Alana McGee]

Hi Alana,

Thanks for the info. I had already checked the NAMA poisoning site but there was nothing there!
But sometimes, we hear of things that do not get reported.

For chanterelles, I have not had them tested, but I have had them from many areas and I still have
problems. I just limit how much I eat and I do ok.

So true, about only eating a little the first time and the ever popular ‘When in doubt, throw it out!”.
Or at least don’t eat it and try to save for id’ing with an expert.

When we first started mushrooming, I thew away a bunch of good edibles, since I wasn’t sure of the
id and I did not have someone close by to verify my id.

Just yesterday, someone posted some photos of some boletes he found, and asked it he could cook
them up for dinner. It did not appear that he even tried to id them. They were a highly toxic species.

When we do start with truffles, it will be nice to add you to our list of expert id help!!!
QUICK REPLY

[Alana McGee]

You bet 🙂 With truffles, we can tell really quickly if it one of the choice ones (plus some others). But otherwise you can always contact Matt Trappe or Greg Bonito (whom I believe is now at the U. of Michigan, but they can be a bit delayed on getting back to folks sometime! Or Mike Castellano in Oregon!

[Author]

Posts