Brown Rollrim
Paxillus involutus · Paxillaceae
Also called Poison Pax
Once eaten widely in Europe, now known to cause a fatal immune reaction that builds up over repeated meals.
Deadly poisonous. DEADLY. Repeated meals can trigger an immune reaction that destroys red blood cells, which has killed people who had eaten it safely for years. Cooking does not help.
Read the full foraging safety guidance.
Season
July to November
Where it grows
- Birch
- Broadleaf woodland
- Damp ground
Identification
- Cap
- 5-15cm, ochre to rusty brown, velvety, sticky when wet, with a strongly inrolled edge and a grooved margin.
- Gills / pores
- Decurrent, ochre-buff, crowded, easily rubbed off the flesh, BRUISING DARK BROWN.
- Stem
- Short, stout, brown, bruising darker.
- Flesh
- Pale yellow, browning when cut.
- Spore print
- Rusty brown.
- Smell & taste
- Faintly acidic.
Lookalikes
Some boletes and brown-capped edibles. The inrolled grooved edge and bruising soft gills are distinctive.
In the kitchen
Never eat.
Also deadly
Death Cap
Amanita phalloides
Responsible for the great majority of fatal mushroom poisonings worldwide. Learn this one before anything else.
Destroying Angel
Amanita virosa
Pure white, elegant and lethal. The one to check for whenever you pick a white mushroom.
Deadly Webcap
Cortinarius rubellus
A modest orange-brown mushroom whose poison destroys the kidneys weeks after the meal.