Scoffing ceps from the woods

It's been feeling all nice and Autumnal and its been damp for a few weeks, and so I went foraging with the dog and got lucky with the ceps - AKA Boletus Edulis - probably the best mushroom you can find in the woods - good firm texture, tasty, generally not maggoty AND they get quite big

Boletus Edulis (i.e. cep) on the tiger table

The one above is a decent size  - about 12 cm in height and nice and weighty in the hand

Here's on as it was found in the lovely earthy woods

And another - Betty Pug is some way behind it. It's not that big.

The shot below shows the rest of them back at the house on my dining table.
The bigger ones were a bit past it in places

A good haul - lots of ceps on the tiger table

A cute button cep

and another...

You can see, these have been gnawed by molluscs.

And so to breakfast...

For this, I decided to use my hand-made kitchen knife, just cause I fancied it : )

A thin slice through the cap shows the pores 

The two bigger ones had a few parts that were a bit past-it, so I cut off what I could and saved that for drying.

This looks like a lot, but once dried, it shrinks down to hardly anything.

The remaining fresh ones made up a decent amount

This slice shows the solid meaty flesh and even texture through the bole

And so knobs of butter went into the pan...

Followed by the chopped ceps.

While that was frying, I chopped up a lovely olive bloomer with a bit of rye in it

Slap on a bit of butter

Meanwhile, back at the pan, the ceps start to firm up as they cook and go a bit translucent. The caps also go darker

Ceps caramalise well and they soon start to develop a lovely brown colour and smell amazing...

Closer up

A bit later again and they are browned evenly and ready to make the sauce with.

For this, I used some chopped fresh thyme. Just the soft leaves from the tips of tender shoots

I save the stalky bits for adding to other things

Next, crushed and chopped garlic - just 3 cloves

Chopped parsley...

Slap it in along with a decent dollop or two of cream cheese.

Stir until salivating

I added a little milk to dilute the gloopy cream cheese a bit

mmm... 

And there it was. Delicious!
I ate this outdoors in the garden as seemed befitting