It’s morel mushroom time here in Montana. Unfortunately, I haven’t gotten any the last two weeks because my supplier has been bought out by a guy who ships them to Japan.
In Montana, morels go for $5 a pound wholesale and $8-10 a pound retail.
We’re wondering, how much does a pound of fresh morels cost in Japan?
Thanks,
Whistlepig
Just to show how devoted I am to the Straight Dope, I actually got dressed and hauled my downstairs to the grocery store to check, even though it’s only 10am on a Saturday morning.
According to this website, morels are very similar to, but not exactly the same as, Japanese matsutake mushrooms, and are sometimes called American matsutakes.
In any case, the matsutakes don’t seem to be in season just yet, as the store didn’t have any (shiitakes, btw, were about $6-$8 a pound). I don’t believe they come in until autumn.
After looking around a few websites, I found prices ranging from as high as US$600/lb. for the top quality ones, down to $15/lb. for the lowest quality.
Oh yeah, here’s where I found my pricing data
http://www.crop.cri.nz/psp/broadshe/matsutak.htm
Although this site (in Japanese) says that the wholesale price in 2001 for the highest grade was US$35-75/kg, with the highest price bid at about $300/kg.
My wife just got up so I asked her how much they were. She said “about 4 or 5000 yen for a pack of ten.” which would be about US$40.
As an ex-avid mushroom picker, I can tell you that morels are most emphatically not the same thing as matsutake. From your first link:
The author is merelly saying that henceforth he will use the word “matsutake” in the same way that “morel” and “chanterelle” are used for their respective species.
Here is a good site with info and pics of morels. Compare with this pic of matsutake mushrooms.
The price of matsutake varies greatly depending on date, provenance, size and aspect. Local matsutakes are the most expensive, followed by Chinese, North Korean and Canadian imports. Whereas the Asian imports are all the same species, the Canadian ones are slightly different (they are much paler for instance) and are sold significantly cheaper.
But you’re not asking about matsutake, you’re asking about morels.
I have never seen morels at the store, so it is a luxury item and I had to look up the word in a dictionary. Morels in Japanese are called amigasatake. Googling a bit reveals that morels are indeed native to Japan. They typically grow from march and are often found under cherry trees.
So, anyway, I googled some more but alas, I could not come up with a single price quote. The closest I came was a place that had dried Chinese morels, but no price.
Most probably imported morels are sold directly to French restaurants as searching for “moriiyu” confirms that a few places have it on their menu.
Whatever consumption of amigasatake there is in Japan, it’s exclusively of self-picked mushrooms. Don’t expect to find any at the local store.
