Cep (spruce form)

Description

This is the spruce, or type, form of the cep (Boletus edulis f. edulis). In 1966 the mycologist B. P. Vassilkov described eighteen forms of the cep, separated by their mycorrhizal partner, season and climate; on that view the cep is a species in the broad sense (Boletus edulis sensu lato), and four of these forms are treated by other authors as species in their own right. Boletus edulis — cep, penny bun or porcino — is the type species of the genus Boletus and is prized as an edible mushroom. The fruit body has a large brown cap up to 30 cm across; like other boletes it has tubes rather than gills beneath the cap, and the pore surface is whitish when young, ageing to greenish-yellow. The stout stipe is white or yellowish and partly covered with a raised network pattern. This form grows in spruce and fir forests and fruits from June to October.