Three new mushroom species found in UK grocery store
The mushrooms in question were new species of porcini, that means “little pigs” in Italian. Biologists Bryn Dentinger and Laura Suz genetically analysed the contents of a packet of porcini and found 15 species inside. Three of those species have never been named or described until now.
Novel varieties of porcini aren’t especially groundbreaking. Scientists estimate that there up to ten million species of fungi currently in existence, with about 1,200 new species added each year. A total of 18 new species of porcini have been discovered since 2000 alone. But the fact that these previously undiscovered mushrooms were mixed into our food supply goes to show how little even food producers know about biodiversity, meaning that we could be eating unidentified fungi all the time.
As the researchers point out, not knowing what we’re eating or exporting is at least a little alarming. “The recognition of these species will enable better regulations to improve food safety and to enable countries to adhere to international agreements on exploitation of wildlife,” they write.
The mushrooms were the product of Tropical Wholefoods, sold at a Gaia Wholefoods in Twickenham. Like half of all the porcini in Italy, however, they originated in China, which currently exports huge amounts of mushrooms at a fraction of the cost of European sources. China itself is the world’s largest mushroom exporter and consumer, with Yunnan province—where the new species originated, along with many other varieties of mushrooms—composing more than half of the country’s export value.
The sudden appearance of brand-new species probably has less to do with poor inspection and more to do with producers lacking a DNA sequencer to analyse every single fungus that gets harvested.
Attempts at cultivating the mushrooms on a mass scale have failed in the past, so porcini remain foraged, not farmed. Despite their comparatively lower cost, Chinese porcini have a bad rep among cooks as being of inferior quality to European mushrooms, but their price still makes them attractive to consumers who don’t know or care about the difference.
China’s had its share of problems with oversight and safety in its food exports, from a series of staph infections traced to canned mushrooms to the largest foodborne illness outbreak in German history, which was tied to frozen Chinese strawberries. In the case of these mushrooms, though, the sudden appearance of brand-new species probably has less to do with poor inspection and more to do with producers lacking a DNA sequencer to analyse every single fungus that gets harvested.
And, to the non-mycologist at least, the descriptions of the three new species sound virtually identical: “Edible, fleshy mushroom with light- to brown cap, clavate stipe, and a tubular greenish-yellow at maturity.” Consumers who don’t know the difference between a clavate stipe and, say, a fusiform one likely won’t ever be able to tell if what they’re eating is a type of life form previously unknown to science.
Source: munchies.vice.com
