Fresh and dried shiitake mushrooms are a popular ingredient in ... quality to many vegetarian and vegan recipes. In Japan, they use them as the base for vegetarian dashi, and, in China, cooks ...

The third choice of this series on dried food looks at dried shiitake mushrooms. Its rich umami adds depth to the flavor of simmered dishes and soups, but it takes time to reconstitute the fungus.

Japan is one of the leading producers of shiitake mushrooms. These mushrooms are notoriously difficult to cultivate on a commercial scale — especially when using the 1,000-year-old Japanese ...