Saturday, January 24, 2009

Groovy Mushroom Madness!

TheMartianMan and I have quite the affinity for mushrooms...If you are having hazy memories of your time spent at Woodstock, now is the time to stop. I am not talking about the psychedelic shrooms, just the everyday kind that you might top a pizza with. We like to buy them from the local farmer's market in the summer, but have difficulty in obtaining them during the winter unless we get them from the chain grocery stores. We hate to do that because they really aren't as fresh. Anyway, some weeks back we ordered a mushroom kit. Essentially, it was a cardboard box of dirt and manure that had been inoculated(or seeded)to grow button mushrooms. I checked on the kit a few days ago and it had several smallish white clumps.They were rather disappointing to look at then, but not anymore! Some of these are about 3 inches across. Mmmm...gotta figure out what to make for dinner...



I decided to add a picture of the mushroom that I actually cooked for dinner. These things grow exponentially.A few hours really do make a difference. For scale, I placed a quarter next to it. Keep in mind that these are the same kind of button mushrooms that commonly come in a cute little can. I really don't think that one of our "Martian" mushrooms would even fit in a can!

2 comments:

Laurie Chase Kruczek said...

Looking great! How exciting to grow them yourself!

We sent some mushroom kits to my brother last Christmas, and they produced several crops for him. He is now going to start a permanent morel garden in his yard. Excellent, huh?

How did yours taste?

Carolyn Evans-Dean said...

We decided to make something classic that would make it clear to us if the flavor was good or not. TheMartianMan made a steak with onions, peppers and (of course!)mushrooms. I don't eat steak, but I opted for a cheeseburger with onions, mushrooms and parmesan cheese. I used one HUGE mushroom just for myself!It was really good. I have been looking for excuses to use mushrooms in everything that I've been cooking.

That is really cool that your brother is starting a permanent morel patch, Laurie. I have never had a morel because I can't find them naturally occurring around here and they are sooo expensive. I have seen kits to produce morels, shitake and several other varieties. I can't wait to try them all, though some of them need a particular type of wood to grow on and have to be grown outside..