This is a huge polypore that can sometimes weigh 50 lbs. It usually has several broad convex to flattened caps, often depressed in the center, 3 to 10 inches, across, creamy white to yellowish brown, with concentric dull orange-brown bands.

The white flesh of mature specimens is tough and leathery. The pores under the cap are large enough to see.

The spore print is white.

The knobby, yellowish, rooting stalk is 2-4 inches long, 1-1/4 to 2 inches thick.

This mushroom grows from the roots, sometimes buried, of oak and other deciduous trees in much of North America, especially the East. Most common in the summer, it sometimes persists into the fall.

Way too tough and bitter to eat when mature, it's edible when very young, when it resembles a lump with the finger-like projections that will become the caps. Any part you can pinch through with your fingernails is edible, although most mushroom hunters discard it as inferior.

But you can make it taste good by marinating in oil and vinegar with spices, and baking it, then pressing out the excessive oil with paper towels.

When my then-girlfriend perpared this mushroom for me, she forgot to follow my instructions, and served it to me without pressing out the oil. It was like drinking a quarter of cup of olive oil with dinner, and my nauseated stomach felt like it was going to explode from bloating for half the night.

She apologized for her carelessness, and I forgave her, but the next time I found Berkeley's polypore and she prepared it, she repeated the mistake, with the same results.

Now I just have to smell Berkeley's polypore, and I beegin to feel sick to my stomach. But the following year, the same girlfriend didn't fare very well when I served her other wild mushrooms. Click here to find out what happened.

Now I just have to smell Berkeley's polypore, and I begin to feel sick to my stomach. But the following year, the same girlfriend didn't fare very well when I served her other wild mushrooms. Click here to find out what happened.