The blue green anise mushroom (Clitocybe odora) belongs to the Tricholomataceae family. It is not very large. The mushroom picker distinguishes it because its turquoise blue-green cap and its anise odour.
The blue green anise mushroom has a rather thin cap, 3-8 cm in diameter, often not circular but with some sinus, with a smooth and dry surface. The colour ranges from turquoise to pale grey, in general deeper in the centre and in humid weather, and with radial fibers. Beneath, it has whiter than the cap, adnate laminae -they reach just the edge between the foot and the cap-, several of them incomplete or branched. The stipe is short, narrow and cylindrical, light coloured in pale grey greenish as the laminae, of elastic consistency and with a swollen by entwined with bits of soil and litter white mycelium bottom.
The blue green anise mushroom grows in holm oak, oak and pine forests, usually in groups in autumn season.
The blue green anise is an aromatic, strong taste, edible mushroom. It suits better to seasoning rather than as a single mushroom species in one dish. Beware not to mix up with white or cream colour species of Clitocybe (C.dealbata, C.rivulosa…) that are toxic.
[photos Montserrat Porta and Jordi Badia]