The bad shrooms
Things would often go missing from the fridge in our dorms - mostly my stuff, as I actually cooked and therefore kept myself well stocked with essentials such as milk and veg etc. I'm also allergic to everything, so had goats milk instead of normal moo milk. It'd piss me off when this mysteriously dripped away over about a day, but there was little I could do about it, and it wasn't like I'd put much effort into actually producing it myself. No, what was annoying was when foods I'd prepared myself would get snaffled. It takes quite a little time to make a good mushroom sauce, and this would regularly go missing. I had an idea.

I've always been into mushrooms. Not the hallucinogenic ones, more the wild mushrooms which sprout from the most unexpected places almost overnight and taste a thousand times better than any of the watery white rubbish you get in the supermarkets. Whole armies of pale, ethereal umbrellas in the undergrowth. I would regularly go out in pick them from the parks ad footpaths, and my room was filled with strings of dried mushrooms hanging from the ceiling, turning gently in the draft from under the windowsill. On one particular mushroom-hunting journey, I came across a mushroom which would be instrumental to my revenge.

The common shaggy ink cap. They grow all over the place, and I'd found a large clump. Now if you look these up in a book, it may well tell you that they're edible. Another book will tell you that they're quite poisonous and you should avoid them. Others are more ambiguous - so what's going on?

The shaggy ink cap is actually delicious - it has a wonderfully rich, intense mushroom flavour and will almost melt into anything you make, turing it a lovely inky black colour if you use some of the older, larger fruits. However, if you ingest alcohol for anything up to THREE DAYS after eating the mushrooms, you will experience severe side-effects which can include nausea, vomiting and heart palpitations. Nasty. Of course, I don't really drink much at all (just not my thing, it's not a matter of principle) so I would be fine, but if anyone nicked it, well, let's just say that there was an entire wall built out of empty beer cans in the kitchen.

That evening was interesting.
( Hampster Squared has stuff at www.tilla.co.uk, Thu 18 Sep 2008, 23:32, 6 replies)

Hmmm,
I was on an antibiotic once that made you puke if you so much as let a little alcohol past your lips.
( Batshitmentalist is sane for once, Thu 18 Sep 2008, 23:50, closed)

As much as I am generally against
food sabotage, I like this.

It's rather elegant and has had some thought put into it, rather than the "yer let's piss/spluff/puke/grolley into someone's beer/mayonnaise/soup/peas" school of unthought.
( warmfuzzies Isn't here, Fri 19 Sep 2008, 3:32, closed)

Most excellent
Clever, elegant and delicious(ly evil). Clicky!
(Potty Jag har smör i min rumpspringa, Fri 19 Sep 2008, 8:49, closed)

Not quite...
Some confusion here between the common ink cap (coprinopsis atramentaria), which shouldn't be eaten with alcohol, and the shaggy ink cap (coprinus comatus) which is edible when young and has no reaction with alcohol.
(ubergeekian, Fri 19 Sep 2008, 10:27, closed)

Ah true
I did say the 'common shaggy ink cap' which in terms of ink caps is a bit vague. Actual shaggy ink caps usually decay far too quickly for me to do much with. Apologies my mycologically minded friend!
( Hampster Squared has stuff at www.tilla.co.uk, Fri 19 Sep 2008, 15:45, closed)

cmon!
Share with us how the evening panned out!
(lazy killer robot found that beer tastes better when your older, Mon 22 Sep 2008, 5:02, closed)