Growing Gourmet and Medicinal Mushrooms

We continue to explore the many health reasons that make it worth adding mushrooms to your diet.

But what if you’ve tried canned mushrooms and declared you don’t like them. Or, you’re tired of eating the same white button mushrooms. Or you simply can’t get the variety you want at the local grocery store?

Then it’s time you learned about growing gourmet and medicinal mushrooms.

There are so many varieties and categories of mushrooms that it’s worth finding the flavors you do like, because canned mushrooms don’t count! There are new recipes to try along with new mushroom tastes and textures. And, there are so many health benefits locked inside those mushrooms, waiting for you to access when you eat these delicious and nutritious fungus.

So let’s explore growing gourmet and medicinal mushrooms, so we can all add them to our plates.

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Understanding the Different Types of Mushrooms

There are some mushrooms that are easier to grow at home, due to the type of fungus. When deciding to grow a gourmet mushroom, it’s recommended you choose a saprotrophic mushroom.

Here’s why.

Saprotrophic mushrooms break down plant matter and convert it into nutrients, so they thrive on dead and decaying material. That makes them easier to grow because you can use substrate such as wood chips, recently felled trees, and more. They also tend to fruit quickly, often within six months.

Common saprotrophic mushrooms include the white button and oyster mushrooms. In fact, the easiest mushroom to grow for beginners is the oyster mushroom. They are flavorful and provide known health benefits.

But you’re not limited to those common varieties. Saprotrophic mushrooms also include the health-boosting Shiitake, Reishi and more.

Saprotrophic are easier to grow than mycorrhizal mushrooms, which latch on to a plant’s root system and grow through the soil. The mushroom and the plant both receive better access to nutrients deep within the soil, but conditions need to be right to create growing conditions at home.

Mycorrhizal mushrooms include truffles and chanterelles, which are better found foraging in the woods.

For these reasons, it’s best to choose saprotrophic mushrooms to grow at home.

Growing Gourmet and Medicinal Mushrooms at Home

There are different ways to grow mushrooms, some more complicated than others. First, it helps to understand the most important terms related to mushroom growing.

• Substrate: the material in which mushrooms grow.
• Spores: what mushrooms produce instead of seeds. They are microscopic and each mushroom produces millions of them.
• Mycelium: the living or vegetative part of the mushroom.
• Spawn: mycelium grown onto a substrate, which is like the seeds for growing mushrooms. This spawn is used to inoculate substrate to reproduce the fungus.
• Inoculated substrate: this means the substrate has been injected with mushroom spawn.

The next step in growing mushrooms is understanding your environment, and whether you can grow mushrooms naturally, or you need to purchase special equipment.

Outside, mushrooms will need a shady, humid location that doesn’t get direct sunlight. A patch that’s surrounded by trees or bushes is best.

For those growing indoors, the same type of environment is still important. Mushrooms thrive best in humid, dark, settings. Some people choose to purchase special mushroom growing “huts” or houses with special lamps. It just depends how much you want to invest, in time and money.

Mushroom Growing Kits

The simplest way to grow mushrooms in any climate or environment is to purchase a mushroom growing kit. These pre-packaged kits have everything you need, which is essentially an inoculated substrate inside of a grow bag. Instructions tell you how to care for the kit, and soon you’ll be harvesting mushrooms.

The nice part about a kit is that you don’t have to worry about the type of mushroom (saprotrophic, mycorrhizal or other) because they arrive ready to grow. So you can choose healthy and flavorful mushrooms like Morels, Shiitake, Reishi, Oyster, Lion’s Mane and more.

Mushroom Spore Syringe

Another option for growing mushrooms at home is to use a mushroom spore syringe. These can be made on your own, or purchased. A syringe contains the mushroom spores suspended in water.

To use one of these, you create a growing area appropriate for the type of mushroom you want to grow. Different mushrooms grow in different materials, such as wood chips, or even coffee grounds.

Then you use the mushroom spore syringe to inoculate the material or substrate which introduces a mushroom spawn into your planting area.

Mushroom Plugs

An option for those with felled trees in their yard is to purchase a plug spawn.

This product arrives as a hardwood dowel with mycelium growing inside. To start the process, you drill holes into logs. Then you tap the dowels into the logs, and seal with wax so the spawn doesn’t dry out.

This is a good option because you don’t need special equipment, other than a drill. It does take a little longer for mushrooms to grow and fruit, but it’s good for beginners.

Making Your Own Spawn

If you get really advanced, you can create your own spawn. This requires special equipment like a pressure cooker and a sterilized environment. It can be rewarding, but it certainly isn’t easy.

Why You Want to Grow Gourmet and Medicinal Mushrooms

Whichever method you choose, there are several reasons that make it worth growing gourmet and medicinal mushrooms.

Whether it’s Shiitake, Maitake, or Reishi, to name just a few, adding a variety of mushrooms to your diet will provide a boost to your well-being that’s both noticeable and somewhat “behind the scenes.”

Depending on the type of mushroom, science continues to uncover the following beneficial properties:

• Cancer-fighting and tumor-fighting
• Antioxidant
• Boost the immune system
• Aid with sleep
• Combat allergies
• Help balance blood sugar
• Help fight off depression
• Aid in digestion
• Brain-boosting
• Anti-inflammatory
• Rich in a variety of vitamins and minerals
• Low in fat and cholesterol
• High in fiber

Plus, mushrooms add different tastes and textures to your recipes, including the flavor of seafood or chicken. They can serve as a meat substitute. Or, in their simplest form, they’re still delicious as a side with a grilled steak.

Final Thoughts

This guide should cover the most common steps to learning how to grow mushrooms at home, from the simple use of grow kits to handling the more complex inoculation of substrate on your own. For more information, the mushroom guru Paul Stamets has published a comprehensive guide.

If you decide not to grow your own, and your local store stocks a smaller variety of mushrooms, even the more common portobello packs a health punch that makes them worth eating. Button and oyster mushrooms are also common and are still very healthy additions to all kinds of recipes.

For those who are still on the fence about eating whole mushrooms, there are supplements available and mushroom powder that can be added to drinks. This allows even those who don’t like the taste or texture of mushrooms to still access their powerful health benefits.

And for those ready to be more adventurous, try growing gourmet and medicinal mushrooms at home, where you can enjoy the fruits of your labor in a delicious new recipe.

Sources

https://medium.com/@darcyogdonnolan/how-to-grow-gourmet-and-medicinal-mushrooms-2020-124b0572f2aa

https://www.tyrantfarms.com/6-gourmet-and-medicinal-mushrooms-you-can-easily-grow-in-your-garden/

https://www.mushroom-appreciation.com/types-of-mushrooms.html#sthash.7WB4xvbF.dpbs

https://namyco.org/growing_mushrooms_at_home.php

https://northspore.com/pages/spawn-faq

https://www.midwestgrowkits.com/mushroom/Mushroom-Growing-Terminology-Glossary

https://learn.freshcap.com/growing/the-easiest-way-to-grow-mushrooms-at-home/

https://www.fieldforest.net/category/plug-spawn