Through the early days of the pandemic, it appeared like rising your individual meals was all the craze. I noticed these mushroom rising kits talked about by folks and I used to be fairly curious to strive them however by no means obtained round to it till now. My S.O. loves mushrooms and it appeared like a cool concept to develop your individual. I made a decision to see if mushroom kits are value it by way of the fee and time concerned. So come together with me whereas I strive it out!

What’s a Mushroom Equipment?

Initially, I made a decision to begin with the simplest solution to develop mushrooms – from a package. There are different strategies for rising your individual mushrooms, like drilling holes right into a log and inserting “spawn plugs” into them. Or you can get much more hands-on and create your individual substrate and inoculate it with mycelium, and many others. However since I do know nothing about rising mushrooms and I need to strive essentially the most foolproof methodology first, I went with shopping for a pair kits.

I really discovered a vendor who’s in the identical state as me (Ohio), so I made a decision to present him my enterprise. He calls himself Mushroom Man and has loads of useful movies on his web site. Sure forms of mushrooms can’t be shipped this time of yr (March) as a result of chilly, however I used to be in a position to get a shiitake package and a white oyster mushroom package.

The associated fee for many mushroom kits appear to run about $25. With delivery, these kits value me a complete of $62.80. Oyster and shiitake mushrooms value about $10-$12 per pound, so to make this endeavor value efficient, I’d have to get about 5-6 kilos of mushrooms from the 2 kits mixed. It’s purported to be potential to get a second harvest after the primary one, so we’ll see the way it goes. Regardless, I feel this will likely be enjoyable to strive.

The kits arrived very promptly inside a couple of days and appear like this:

The white oyster package is on the left and the shiitake is on the precise. As you possibly can see, there are some directions on every, together with a QR code that you could scan for educational movies particular to your number of mushroom. (I used to be unable to get the QR code to work, however I nonetheless discovered the movies on the web site.)

From what I perceive, these kits are mainly made up of sawdust inoculated with the mycelium of every particular mushroom selection. For now, there may be nothing I have to do with these kits however permit them to take a seat at room temperature for some time and out of direct daylight. After a sure time frame (14-21 days for the oysters, 40 days for the shiitake), I’ll take additional steps to hydrate the kits and get the mushrooms to begin rising.

So for now I’ve set them on a shelf in my workplace the place they are going to get some mild from the room, however no direct rays. They should be out of the field to get some air. There’s a vent within the plastic bag to permit some oxygen in:

Replace: My Mushroom Equipment Outcomes

I’ll simply minimize proper to the chase and say that my outcomes from these kits had been fairly disappointing, and I positively adopted all of the directions fastidiously. The shiitake kits produced no mushrooms in any respect, and the oyster package did produce some mushrooms, however definitely not sufficient to justify the fee. Learn on for an outline and pictures of the method:

Rising White Oyster Mushrooms From a Equipment

The white oyster mushrooms had a shorter develop time-frame than the shiitake, so I began to see lively mycelium development straight away. After a couple of days, it seemed like this:

I used to be excited to see how shortly it was rising. Two weeks after I acquired the kits, the white oyster mushroom package seemed like this:

At that time, as soon as the package was stuffed with mycelium, I used to be supposed to chop an X into the entrance of the package and put that opened facet down into some clear, non-chlorinated water to soak for about 24 hours. Then the package is positioned on its facet once more, sitting propped barely above a plate of unpolluted water for humidity.

I adopted all of the directions fastidiously, together with to make use of water that I had boiled and allowed to chill, sterilized my fingers and any instruments I used, set the package on prime of a pair jar lids in order that it wouldn’t be straight sitting within the water, and maintaining it out of direct daylight always. I had a spritzer to sometimes spritz a little bit of water on the opening and the mushrooms as wanted.

Quickly the package seemed like this:

You’ll be able to see the mushrooms starting to push their means via the opening. Over time, lots of the tiny mushrooms merged collectively to kind bigger ones. At concerning the one month mark, my mushrooms seemed like this:

I wasn’t certain how lengthy to allow them to go, however after a couple of extra days it appeared just like the bigger ones had been getting a bit dried out across the edges, so I harvested them. The Mushroom Man really useful going forward and eradicating the entire mushrooms directly and never leaving the small ones, in any other case the package can develop into contaminated to your second development.

I weighed the mushrooms I obtained, which got here to five.60 ounces. I don’t know if we didn’t prepare dinner them correctly or if I left them rising too lengthy, however they got here out relatively chewy once we cooked them up with some pasta.

Anyway, not a terrific haul contemplating the price of the package. I used to be hopeful that I may get a second and even third flush of mushrooms. However that was to not be. At first I appeared to be getting a second spherical of mushrooms, however then they stopped rising once they had been nonetheless too small to do something with:

This was as huge as they ever obtained they usually completely dried out as I saved ready for them to develop some extra. Oyster mushrooms at my native grocery retailer are presently $8.99 per pound (which is 56 cents per ounce). Which suggests I obtained about $3.00 value of mushrooms from a $30 package. So the oyster package was a little bit of a fail. However not as a lot of a fail because the shiitake package.

Rising Shiitake Mushrooms From a Equipment

First off, shiitake mushrooms are apparently trickier to develop than oysters and another varieties, and if I had identified that, I in all probability wouldn’t have chosen them, as a result of it didn’t go effectively.

Shiitake are slower rising, so I needed to wait about 40 days simply leaving them within the bag out of direct daylight earlier than taking the following step. I used to be additionally purported to ship an image to the Mushroom Man to have him confirm whether or not it was able to proceed, which I did. Once I was prepared to maneuver on, the package seemed like this:

I then needed to minimize the bag open, fill it with chilly water to soak the block and permit the whole package to take a seat for twenty-four hours within the fridge.

The subsequent day, I dumped out the water and minimize away the bag, apart from a bit across the base of the block, about an inch, to maintain the mushrooms from making an attempt to develop into the water on the plate. Like the opposite package, I once more set it on a plate of unpolluted water, propped up by a pair jar lids. However for shiitake, in addition they require a plastic bag as a humidity tent, which was offered.

Over the following few weeks, I spritzed the within of the tent with water as wanted to make sure it was saved humid. I used to be purported to hopefully begin seeing some mushroom development round day 10, however was additionally informed that shiitake will be finicky and will take a pair additional weeks and to be affected person. The block turned darkish brown because it was purported to, however I waited and waited and no mushrooms ever sprouted. Here’s what it seemed like after 45 days within the tent and I lastly gave up on it:

I threw it out in my compost bin. The man who offered them did have some form of assure and would in all probability have despatched me a brand new one, however frankly I simply didn’t need to cope with it once more.

Have been the Mushroom Kits Price It?

It was fairly cool to look at the oyster mushrooms develop, however strictly by way of financial worth, no means. Would I do it once more? In all probability not. I feel I anticipated these kits to be fairly foolproof, however they’re really relatively tough. So simply preserve that in thoughts in the event you determine to present it a strive.

Up to date 7/8/2022, Initially revealed 3/22/2022