Mushroom Magic

Can you see them?

Those tiny little new growths are called pins. This means our mycelium which had been growing in substrate is ready for the fruiting chamber!

We started by sterilizing grains of corn in quart sized bottles. Next we injected mushroom spore into the jars and have them a good shake. We put the jars in boxes and waited for the spores to colonize the corn.

We kept track of our mycelium growth in the jars of corn.

But we also had some colonized grain ready to go into substrate, a mixture of wood pellets and soil, which we also sterilized and hydrated with boiling water. We added the colonized corn to the substrate. We did 3 containers. 2 had the same spore and the 3rd had a different one.

We put all the containers, with their lids on, into a larger container with a lid on it. It's important to keep things as sterile as possible so the spores we want to grow don't get contaminated with things we don't want to grow.

We wore gloves and used isopropyl alcohol in a spray bottle very generously.

When the entire container is white with mycelium, it is removed from the colonizing bin into a fruiting bin.

Once the completely white, colonized containers are ready for fruiting, they go in the fruiting bin with their lids off.

Once the mushrooms start growing you know it's time to pick them when the little frill along the stem that looks like a skirt or a flat tutu starts to open.

Before harvesting every single mushroom, though, we let some continue to grow. Once they are mature, we can harvest spores from the bottom of the caps.

We haven't yet harvested any, but we are going to have a LOT of mushrooms from what we have growing now.

Each brick can be harvested several times before it is finished fruiting and dried out. Even after the brick is dry, you could get a couple more harvests if you rehydrate it. Just set it in a pan of water overnight!

We have four strains in total growing. Two strains are in the jars with the corn and the other two strains in the containers with the substrate.

I really enjoy watching how tenacious these little spores are and how quickly they propagate.

This one is ready to be put in substrate. We've just put several jars of corn into little containers inside substrate, but a few of the jars are a bit slow to get going. I assume this is because they are a different strain, but I'm not an expert.

I'm looking forward to growing many more toes of mushroom for gourmet and medicinal purposes.

My all time favorite mushroom is one I foraged for when I was a little girl. We lived in Hamburg and there was a forest just a few feet from our house. My step-father and I wandered all around moving leaves from the base of the trees until we found bright yellow mushrooms.

They are called chanterelle mushrooms. They are yellow, orange, or white and grow in the shape of an oyster. They smell like woodsy apricots and are just a little peppery.

Chanterelles were the only kind of mushroom I would eat for years! Until I was well into my 20s I thought all other mushrooms were just gross. It probably didn't help that my mother sometimes served mushrooms in a snail shell.

At one point, there were snails in the shells. My mom saved the shells after cooking the escargot, and would put mushrooms inside them.

Eeeewwwwwwwwww.

As an adult, however, I have learned to love all kinds of mushrooms. I really want to grow my own chanterelles, but finding the exact right spot and the exact type of log are proving more expensive than I had hoped.

I'd also love to grow other toes of oyster mushrooms. And shiitake, lion's mane, turkey tails and more.

I'm trying to eat less meat, so I would love to have different flavor mushrooms with which to make "burgers".

What's your favorite mushroom?

🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄

Lead and first image by author: tiny pins fruiting from a mushroom "brick"