A BIG, FAT PORCINO -- BOLETUS EDULIS

I hadn't counted being flat in the woods today, elbows dug into prickly dried twigs and leaves but there you go, when the porcini are ready, they're ready and must be grabbed before the snails and slugs polish them off. Porcini, ceps in French, are sometimes called "God's gift to humanity."

This particular porcino, which cost me dented elbows, is six inches, 15 cms, across. It's a big one and by itself is enough for porcini risotto for four. If I knew more about photo processing I could no doubt dim the stab of sun and highlight the magnificent stem but I don't. I could climb up the terraces and take more pics but my zeal to take the perfect pic has somehow vanished. What I like about this pic is the dried leaves in the foreground, not the fat fellow itself.

Our property, abandoned for 40 years, used to be a prime public mushroom hunting ground. The first year we were here we were astonished to see people cross our yard, scramble up our steps and vanish into the woods. They would reappear hours later, rather scratched and rumpled, clutching bulging plastic bags. One woman, not exactly short of years, pulled a prize mushroom from her bag and handed it to me. Later, she became my dearest Italian friend. The others who once bagged their porcini here no longer come. Italians are very considerate about such things.

There is a table downstairs piled with porcini this very minute. They can be frozen or dried but we give away those we cannot eat. I still have a jar of dried porcini from last year, after all.

It is a feasting time now. The climate has been exactly right for a bumper crop. First, the rains, then warm weather.