Wood ear

Auricularia auricula-judae

Auriculariaceae

A rubbery ear on elder wood — crunch in soup, and a traditional blood-moving food in Chinese cooking.

Culinary jelly fungus of Chinese and European kitchens.

Parts used: Fruiting body
Traditional notes: Stir-fry and hot-and-sour soup · Circulation folklore as food
Grow · USDA 6b: Temperate hardwood, loves elder Plug spawn into fresh elder or hardwood logs. In work: Jan · Feb · Mar · Apr · Sep · Oct · Nov · Dec
Harvest: When ears are full and still elastic, before they dry to crumbs on the log.

Elder and hardwood. A kit or a soaked dried bag from the grocer is the kitchen path.
Harvest ears while they are still elastic, not rotting-wet.
Dried wood ear reconstitutes in twenty minutes.

Safety

Known jelly-fungus allergy

Lore

Mu er, wood ear — a jelly fungus that has been in Chinese kitchens since at least the Tang. It has almost no flavor and all the crunch, which is the point of a hot-and-sour soup. It drinks the sauce you give it.

The Herbarium — a teaching catalog, not a clinic. Traditional use is history, not a prescription. USDA 6b dates are a week either way, not a promise. Do not eat, drink, or harvest a plant you cannot name.