Morning dew, black berries and winter mushrooms

It's autumn. We enjoyed still one warm weekend on the island in late September. It was 14 degrees C in the morning and nearly 20 in the afternoon. Rose joined us, but no youngsters came this time.

Without any rain in the past couple of weeks the grass was very wet. Morning dew was intense and beautiful, showing all the spiders’ nets. The leaves had turned to autumn colors although there hadn't been any frost at night. Most of the apples and plumbs had dropped from the trees. Only some fishing boats were on the sea.

 

Third generation of butterflies

 

Despite of late September, summer flowers were in blossom and the third generation of butterflies were flying around them. I managed to capture by camera the Queen of Spain Fritillary, which is quite rare and not often seen in Finland this time of the year.

Rowan berries shone red and the branches were drooping heavy the huge amount of berries. These are very healthy berries that could be utilized, but they are bitter and I have never picked them for cooking, just for decoration. Instead, I picked some black berries, Sorbaronia mitschurinii in the garden. These berries are said to be very healthy superfood, they have a strong color and a bit bitter taste. I put it in the juicer together with apples and got bright red juice. In addition to all the flavonoids and vitamins, the taste was good, too.

Mushroom steaks

Rose and I went to pick mushrooms and lingonberries. The first winter mushrooms, Craterellus tubaeformis, had popped up. I also found some Albatrellus ovinus mushrooms. These are mild and tasty mushrooms that turn bright yellow inside when you fry them.

I made steaks from them on Sunday. I brushed the caps with egg and then rolled them in breadcrumbs seasoned with lemon pepper. Then I added butter on a hot skillet and fried them on both sides so long that they got a nice brown color outside and yellow inside. If they don't turn yellow but brown instead, then you have picked the wrong mushroom, Albatrellus confluens, which looks almost the same but doesn't taste good.