Home Growing Mushrooms
For mushroom lovers, there is nothing more exciting to dream about at dinner time than having your very own supply of fresh fungi. Perfect for adding to salads, stir fries, sauces, or just sautéed and eaten by themselves, there are many different types of edible mushrooms that can be grown at home with a minimum of effort and expense.
The easiest way to go about supplying yourself and your family with home-grown mushrooms is to purchase a kit from a mushroom growing supplier. Shiitakes, button mushrooms, oysters, portobellos – kits for all of these can be purchased from internet stores or your local health food company at very reasonable prices. In order to grow properly, these kits - either boxes with specially prepared soil layers or sections of spore-treated logs - need a dark, relatively damp place to stay and will need to be sprayed with water every day or so (depending on the variety you buy, specific needs will vary).
The other option for growing mushrooms is to use part of your compost pile, if you have one, or even an underutilized section of your garden. The same suppliers from which you can purchase kits from will sell spores or treated substrate sections that can be added as a layer in your compost or under a few inches of hardwood chips in your garden. While this method might take a little more time and self-education than the in-house kits, your mushroom crop will be much larger.
Mushrooms have long been used for medicinal purposes beyond mere nutrition. Research has suggested that they reduce the risk of several types of cancers. It's also believed that mushroom extract can help alleviate migraine headaches, and mental disorders such as obsessive-compulsive disorder
