Steve Manfredi laments that when it comes to mushrooms we're still largely in the dark.
So little is known about Australia's native mushrooms. Why does this matter? They're a resource that is virtually untapped. I keep thinking of all the great-tasting mushrooms out there growing, maturing and then rotting in the bush.
Minute steak with preserved mushrooms.Credit: Edwina Pickles
Australia is estimated to have about 250,000 fungal species, including about 5000 mushrooms, of which roughly 5 per cent have been described.
Traditional Aboriginal knowledge and use of fungi was extensive, but little of that knowledge remains.
''There are only a few fungi in Australia which have been well documented as being considered edible by Aborigines,'' writes Arpad C. Kalotas in Fungi of Australia. ''They range from the glutinous Beech Orange of eastern Australia to the unidentified Mulga Bolete of central Australia.''
This knowledge of the edible implies knowledge of the poisonous and inedible fungi. Kalotas cites a note by John White, surgeon-general to the First Fleet, who observed the behaviour of Aborigines: ''As they conducted us to the water, a toadstool was picked up by one of our company, which some of the natives perceiving, they made signs for us to throw it away, as not being good to eat.''
Still, somewhere there must be Oz porcini.