Friends brought us a big basket of blueberries last evening, and that means lots of baking as well as a wealth of blueberries for the freezer.

Today I made whole-grain blueberry scones. I had never made any kind of scones before, but I followed the recipe from Food Wishes and they’re delicious. This recipe uses spelt flour, which they fortunately had at the healthier than I am section at my local grocery store.

I’m enjoying one now, and since these are healthier scones than I might be tempted to make, I’m enjoying it with a cup of chaga tea. What a combination. Force field in a cup, that’s what this stuff is. It says so right on the package.

In fact chaga is nonotus obliquus, a parasitic fungus that grows on trees, usually birch trees. I’ve never found it in the wild. In photos it looks like irregular burnt black gunk. This stuff is considered to be a medicinal mushroom, in fact the king of the medicinal mushrooms, at least in folk medicine circles. Apparently the best way to prepare it is through some kind high pressure extraction process.

The particular elixir mix which was given to me comes in bags of powder containing chaga and some other stuff like rosehips. I’m guessing the other stuff is both filler and helps make the chaga extract more palatable. It tastes like what I might imagine tea made from forest dirt teabags might taste like. It’s very earthy and while I wouldn’t go so far as to call it tasty, I’m going to say not entirely unpleasant.  Clearly, if I keep drinking this stuff I’m going to live forever.