I've never foraged for shrooms but I do enjoy eating them. Are these Chanterelles? They match up to online ID guides as such. Also at what stage are they worth picking?

Guess the first pic is, but the second pic definitely is. I picked a mess of them the other day and we ate em.

How do you prefer to prepare them? I'm open to recipes.

There were also these nearby that obviously are not. Any ideas?

Warrior, the one pictured is buggy. About all that would be good on that one is the outer part of the cap. They are a tasty shroom.

I assume your talking about the chanterelle. There's a big patc of them there and most look past their prime, just dont know whats best to pick.

I don't know what those others ones are. Not something I would eat.

Well, the ones I picked the other day were a bit big and past the prime frying stage, so I sliced them thin and threw them in the crockpot with some beef cube steaks... then made gravy and ate them over the steaks and mashed taters.

But young ones I like to slice in half (or more pieces if they're bigger) dip them in egg, then crushed cracker crumbs, and fry them in butter in a cast iron skillet. Yum.

So they would be good in a gravy then. I'm thinking a good jaegerschnitzel with mushroom gravy.

I had to google that lol. Yeah, just let em simmer a bit in your gravy. You can try one to see if it's tender enough or needs to cook a bit longer.

The german version of our country fried steak, lol. Pork steak pounded thin breaded and fried with a brown mushroom gravy that has a shot of a good red wine in it. I use muscadine for sweet touch to it.

Sounds pretty good. May need to try that with my next batch of mushrooms.

Chanties are good in just about everything. Chanty-onion-barley soup is real good. Scrambled with eggs for breakfast too. I put them in meat loaf as well and are spectacular. Always start out by sautéing them first in a little butter or sesame oil.