Cook it properly, and cook it through

Why

Fungal cell walls are chitin, the same material as an insect shell, and human digestion does very little with it. Heat breaks it down, releases the nutrients inside, and destroys a range of mild toxins present in species that are otherwise perfectly good: morels, honey mushrooms, blewits and chicken of the woods all belong to this group. A large proportion of people who believe they react badly to wild mushrooms have simply been served undercooked ones.

How

1. 01Treat eight to ten minutes of real heat as the floor, not the target.
2. 02Chicken of the woods and lion's mane are thick enough to be brown outside and raw in the middle. Slice thinner or finish in an oven.
3. 03Honey mushrooms are the clearest case for the old advice to parboil: boil several minutes, discard that water, then fry.
4. 04Try a small portion of any species new to you, and only one new species at a time, so that if something disagrees with you it is obvious which thing it was.