Oyster mushrooms

Lately we've been getting some oyster mushrooms from the logs that we inoculated back in the spring.

These were from a poplar that lost a huge limb last winter. It was probably a good six inches in diameter at it's largest and probably at least fifteen feet long.

I cut it up into about five three foot pieces. It took about a little over an hour to inoculate all of the logs.

The oyster mushrooms are not as tasty as the shiitake mushrooms are, at least they aren't to me. They are a little harder to clean as well. Still they are pretty good sauteed in butter.

Holy Shitake!

Lentinula edodes

Today our inoculated maple log had an abundance of shitake mushrooms! The one's from the store are usually grown in sawdust and lack the depth of flavor of those grown on logs.

It's rained a lot lately and the fungi are blooming.

We harvested about one pound of shitakes in the morning.

Later on they went into a saute pan with butter. They are delicious. It doesn't get any better than fresh, free shitakes!

• Shitakes are supposed to be good for your immune system and cardiovascular system. 
• They are a good source of iron
• Source of B vitamins
• Anti-cancer

Shitake Mushrooms!

Last May I innoculated a log from a Maple tree that I chopped down in the back yard.

I used shitake plug spawn that came in the form of short dowel rods.

I drilled holes in the log and drove the dowels in with a hammer. I was supposed to put melted wax over each of the dowel holes but I didn't do that step.

I wasn't sure that they were ever going to produce any mushrooms but today we got our first shitakes to my amazement! People throw around the term "set it and forget it" a lot, but this was truly that. I had totally forgotten about the inoculated log.

So about ten months have elapsed since the log was inoculated. We only got three good sized ones today, but there are some more that will probably be ready in just a couple of days.

This was pretty exciting considering it was totally unexpected. Shitakes are damn good sauteed in butter!