Wood Ear Mushrooms

Wood ear, also sold as black fungus or cloud ear, grows in thin ruffled sheets on tree trunks and is almost always sold dried, in crackly black pieces that look nothing like the finished ingredient. Twenty minutes in warm water and they swell to five or six times their size, becoming soft, dark and faintly translucent.

They are used for texture, not taste. The flavour is close to neutral, but the bite is unlike anything else – simultaneously crunchy and slippery, and it holds up to long cooking without going soft. That is why they turn up in hot and sour soup, in the filling of Vietnamese fried spring rolls and steamed rice rolls, and shredded through cold dressed salads.

After soaking, trim off the tough knobbly bit where the fungus attached to the wood, then slice or chop as needed. Rinse them well, as grit collects in the folds.

Dried wood ear keeps indefinitely in a sealed jar in the pantry, which makes it one of the more useful things to have on hand. It is very low in kilojoules and a reasonable source of dietary fibre and iron.