ANTHONY DONG, executive chef at Futian Shangri-La, Shenzhen, has brought back fresh mushrooms from Yunnan Province to be used as main ingredients for an array of delicate dishes at the hotel’s Chinese restaurant, Shang Garden, which will be available till Sept. 15.

Dong recently visited rural Yunnan to search for seasonal wild mushrooms in the local villages and markets. He brought back nine different mushrooms, which are now being used in 10 dishes and two desserts at the restaurant.

Raw matsutakes with salmon sashimi consists of raw matsutake slices with soy sauce and wasabi, offering the best way to enjoy the real taste of this treasure of the forest. Meanwhile, grilled matsutakes and dried pork slices with rose salt offers a different fragrance and flavor of matsutake.

Ganba mushrooms, compared with matsutakes, are a rarer and more expensive variety. It is not well known, but is treated as a real treasure by Yunnan locals. It tastes like dry preserved beef, which is called ganba in the Yunnan dialect, where the name of this mushroom comes from.

Ganba mushrooms have no caps or gills; they have to be torn piece by piece to clean them. The cleaning process is both time and energy consuming. Those who know the behind-the-scenes hard work and effort it takes to prepare this treat, grow to appreciate this mushroom even more.

Apart from matsutake and ganba mushrooms, Dong has selected seven more seasonal fungi, including black truffle, scaly hedgehog, porcini, brittlegill mushroom and Termitomyces mushroom, to create delicious dishes that will tantalize guests’ tastebuds. Two desserts with Yunnan rose and old-tree tea leaves will give guests a perfect ending to the meal.

The mushroom dishes are priced from 88 yuan (US$13) to 288 yuan, and are subject to 10 percent service charge and 6 percent VAT.(Maggie Tang)