Wood Blewit
Lepista nuda · Tricholomataceae
Also called Blue Stalk
A late-season woodland mushroom with a striking lilac flush and a perfumed smell.
Edible with caution. Must be cooked thoroughly: raw blewits cause stomach upsets, and some people react to them even cooked.
Read the full foraging safety guidance.
Season
September to December
Where it grows
- Broadleaf woodland
- Leaf litter
- Compost heaps
Identification
- Cap
- 5-15cm, bluish-lilac fading to tan-brown from the centre, smooth, edge inrolled.
- Gills / pores
- Crowded, lilac at first, fading to buff, easily separated from the flesh.
- Stem
- Fibrous, distinctly lilac-blue, thickened at the base.
- Flesh
- Pale lilac, soft.
- Spore print
- Pale pink.
- Smell & taste
- Strongly perfumed, often described as floral or of frozen orange juice.
Lookalikes
Purple Cortinarius species have RUSTY brown spores and a cobwebby veil on young stems. Check the pale pink spore print.
In the kitchen
Rich and meaty. Cook well in butter with cream and thyme.
Also caution
Chicken of the Woods
Laetiporus sulphureus
Vivid sulphur-yellow and orange brackets on standing trees, with a texture famously like chicken breast.
Field Blewit
Lepista saeva
A pasture mushroom with a dull buff cap and an unmistakable violet-blue stem.
Morel
Morchella esculenta
The great prize of spring: a honeycombed hollow cone, best hunted on disturbed chalky ground.