The Foraged Foodie

This rotund little mushroom is Scleroderma citrinum, commonly known as the pigskin poison puffball (from here on referred to as PPP).
Pigskin poison puffballs live near the bases or exposed roots of trees, especially oak, maple and conifers.
PPPs are a very common mycorrhizal species, usually found at the bases of older trees (though sometimes young trees can have them as well), and often among exposed roots. (Mycorrhizal means they have a symbiotic relationship with plants, in this case...

 Identification difficulty: Beginner          

So for my 5th micro-post about what we found at the Telluride Mushroom Festival, another new-to-me mushroom: Russula xeramlelina (and friends), commonly known as the shrimp Russula. It's pretty much the only member of the genus considered to be a choice...

Note: this post was intended to be a micro-post, but ended up being a summary of pretty much everything I know about the genus Cortinarius, so it'd quite a substantial post indeed!
One of my fellow mushroom hunters in Telluride told me they have a joke out there, that mushrooms that look like these are called "Jac" for "Just Another Cortinarius"....