Nigel’s Road Test: Grow-Your-Own Oyster Mushrooms-in-a-Book
Tuesday, June 29th, 2010 by NigelA month into my oyster mushroom growing kit, and I’m pleased to report that I am very close to my first crop of mushrooms. It’s actually a lot more exciting than I thought it would be (maybe I need to get out more…), especially after a few weeks of my kit just looking a bit mouldy and not doing anything. However, almost overnight a beautiful crop of soft grey oyster mushrooms has appeared, with the promise of many hundreds more to come.
Once they start coming, it’s amazing how quickly they develop into these delicate, alien shapes - I think oyster mushrooms is going to be a feature on the menu chez Nigel for some time to come!
The instructions are pretty easy to follow, although there are a lot of steps, and if you’ve not done anything like this before then some of them seem pretty abstract. The packet of millet and spores was quite hard, in the end I had to break it up with my hands (the instructions say to break it up into small pieces by bashing the packet). I then distributed the spores throughout the pages of the (pre-soaked) book, bound it up and sealed it in the special bag. The book has to then spend some time in a warmish environment, out of direct sunlight, and then be transferred to the fridge which seems to kick-start the growing process. Finally it comes out of the fridge, and into a space with a bit of light. By this stage I was starting to wonder if it was going to work. But, lo and behold, it did, and now I am a day away from a delicious stir fry, made from the freshest mushrooms I’ve ever eaten.
The money saving aspect of this kit is really starting to be apparent as well. In addition to the mushrooms you can see growing in the photos, the book is covered in hundreds and hundreds of tiny pinheads, each of which is a potential mushroom which could grow to around 7cm in diameter. I’ll keep a tally of the total weight of mushrooms I get out of my kit, and see if we can beat Tesco’s price of under a tenner per kilo. What’s more, my mushrooms will have a significantly smaller carbon footprint, and be 100% fresh.
I’m really enjoying my mushroom kit; it’s fascinating, money-saving, and delicious!
(Apologies to James Herbert for using/abusing his book in this way, however, I hope he appreciates the slightly creepy pics!)
Blogmemes |
Del.icio.us |
Digg |
Furl |
Google |
Netscape |
PlugIM |
Reddit |
Squidoo |
StumbleUpon |
Technorati |
Yahoo My Web
July 14th, 2010 at 3:29 pm
This looks like a great products, i had no idea you could grown proper mushrooms out of an old book. The pics look great…suits James Herbert quite well! I think I’ll have to have a go at growing some myself. Will have to hunt out a suitable book first that should be properly fungified! Maybe Alice in Wonderland
August 18th, 2010 at 9:35 am
Do you have to be careful of using any print with coloured inks in case they are toxic,I take it black ink is mostly graphite which is a form of carbon so not toxic.
Also can corrugated carbon be used?
August 24th, 2010 at 3:56 pm
Hi Angela,
Richard who makes these kits for us says:
I sell the kits to a private chain of schools and they had the mushrooms checked out and they were actually healthier than shop bought mass produced ones!
One reason I say use paperback books is that they use black ink apart from the cover and the amount of colour used in one page is so minute as to be almost immeasurable.
One interesting fact is that they won’t grow on Yellow pages anyway.
I think you may have meant corrugated cardboard (not carbon)? Yes you can grow mushrooms on cardboard but not using this method. If you wish to try this, go to a library and ask for a copy of Growing Gourmet and Medicinal Mushrooms by Paul Stamets.
Does that answer your query?
August 24th, 2010 at 10:37 pm
thanks,
Angela
October 15th, 2010 at 10:00 am
[…] Yep, you read that right, mushrooms in an old book. Check out the picture below. Nigel, from Nigel’s Eco Store fame has been trying them himself and written about them on his blog here. […]
October 15th, 2010 at 12:46 pm
“ll keep a tally of the total weight of mushrooms I get out of my kit, and see if we can beat Tesco’s price of under a tenner per kilo.”
I haven’t spotted any updates - how many mushrooms did you get, and what happened after the initial flush?
June 14th, 2011 at 4:21 am
Do you add any nutrient to the book? and how long do you put the book into the fridge?
June 14th, 2011 at 9:24 am
Can’t remember how long it was in the fridge for - the instructions explain everything. No extra nutrients needed, you just need to keep it wet. I went on holiday and it dried out and sadly when I came back it was all over…