It has a roughly saddle-shaped yellow-brown cap atop a whitish stipe, and grows on soil in woods.

[3] The fruit body of the fungus is grayish or olive-brown, saddle- or mitral-shaped (i.e., resembling a double mitre) and is attached only to the top of the stipe; it may be up to 3.5 centimetres (1+1⁄2 inches) wide.

The paraphyses (sterile cells interspersed between the asci) are club-shaped, filled with oil drops, sometimes branched, and are 6–10 μm at the apex.

[1] The closely related fungus Helvella albipes has a thicker stipe and a two- to four-lobed cap.

[12] A 2005 Korean study investigated the ability of extracts from 67 different mushroom species to perform fibrinolysis, the process of breaking down blood clots caused by the protein fibrin.