Thanks to a wonderful suggestion from a friend of mine over on instagram when I was asking what content people would like to see from the new blog “fungi of the week” was suggested! I don’t quite have the capacity or ability to be consistent to be able to post every single week but fungi of the month felt doable.

And for our first fungi of the month I’ve chosen one many people have probably heard of: The wood ear, or jelly ear.

The reason? Well it was the first fungi I found this year on the second day of January so it felt very appropriate to share as the first fungi of the month.

There’s also very few fungi that are out and about this time of year, let alone edible ones. And the wood ear is pretty abundant, and leaves a smile on my face whenever I come across it.

A cluster of wood ear mushrooms growing on a tree — **Common English Names:** Wood Ear, Jelly Ear, Tree Ear, ear fungus
**Scientific name:** Auricularia auricula-judae
**Welsh name:** Clustiau'r Ysgaw (Elder’s ears)
**Season:** Year round
**Where found:** Mostly on dead or living Elder Trees
**Size:** 3-10cm across for each “ear” when mature but grow in clusters.
**Edibility:** edible, widely used in cooking but has little flavour and a distinct texture.
**Lookalikes:** Amber Jelly fungus (Exidia recisa) which is more transparent, tend to grow more on twigs. But is still very much edible and interchangeable with wood ear!

Key ID features:

Well they basically look like a bunch of funny little jelly ears growing off the side of a tree. They fold in on themselves usually and are quite wrinkly. They’re brown, jelly like but quite firm when you put them between your fingers. Often grow in clusters with each “ear” around 3-10cm. Sometimes they have a sort of white mica layer on them.

They’re soft and velvety, jelly to the touch when wet, but dry to a hard crust against the tree. (great time to forage for storing as dried mushrooms to rehydrate later)

Jelly ears are Satrophytes which means that they feed off dead things, and in this funky fungi’s case they’re usually found on Elder Trees, but they can grow on other species too.

They’re an easy find for a beginner because they’re pretty unique, and their lookalike (amber jelly fungus) is also edible. But as always only forage to eat when you’re 100% sure.

Fungal sweet Treats?!

Traditionally these fungi and their close relatives are used in soups and stews across East Asia, they take on the flavour of whatever they’re cooked in and make a nice texture addition. But one of my favourite facts about them is that they can be used to make sweets!

Alexis Nikole has a video making jelly sweets with them , and there’s even recipes for Jelly Ear Jaffa cakes. A bonus being they’re gelatin free, vegeterian jelly! I just love the idea of a mushroomy jaffa cake.

So much so that I made them myself! They were just as weird and wonderful as I was expecting them, super easy to make, will be trying again.

Digilat collage with brown paper bacround with two paper hearts veticled in the moddle, the top one has a wood ear mushroom in the centre, the bottom a jaffacake

A texture adventure

Another reason I love jelly ears, much like any other jelly fungi if that they’re a lot of fun. They’re fun to wiggle about on trees, fun to squeeze between your fingers, and are soft and velvety to the touch when they’re wet. Even just looking at them poking out of a fallen tree brings me a lot of joy. What’s not to love?

Culture, history and folklore around the jelly ear

In older textbooks this fungi is often referred to as “Jew’s ear” or “Judas’ ear”, supposedly because of its supposed resemblance to Judas’ ear, and the fact that Judas hanged himself from an Elder tree. Even its latin name has “judae” in, and many people understandably don’t like the reference to a whole ethnic group of people being used in either the scientific or common name of a fungus. I have no control over the scientific name, but I chose not to include this in my common names because it doesn’t feel necessary. There are plenty of other great, descriptive names for this wonderful mushroom.
The start of their scientific name (Auricularia auricula) basically just mean’s ear like, ear like. Pretty much everywhere fungi of this family grow it’s associated with ears. We have species like black wood ear(Auricularia heimuer) , and cloud ear (Auricularia cornea) which are often interchanged and confused with our Jelly ears. In France fungi in this family are known as oreilles du chat (cat’s ears), in Dutch muizenoortjes (mouse ears), in Thai หูหนู (rat’s ear).
Historically Jelly Ear has also been used medicinally. It has been used across Europe, boiled in milk, to relieve jaundice and medieval physicians would soak it in rose water overnight as a remedy for eye problems. Medicinal use continued till at least 1860 in the UK.
In the UK this fungus has historically been considered inedible or at least not worth eating.

So that’s the Jelly Ear. What fungi should be February’s fungi of the month?