Ever wonder how our long-ago ancestors knew what herbs were safe to use? Or what they were good for? There are several theories, watching animals, looking at how and where they grow (doctrine of signatures), or even trial-and-error. None of these seem to explain it all. For instance, estimates have been made that the trial-and-error method simply doesn’t make sense…

Webster’s defines “extract” as “to draw forth”, or “to pull out”, and this is precisely what we are trying to do when extracting our mushrooms. The goal is to draw forth as many of the mushroom’s “goodies” (bio-active constituents) as we can with the process. Extraction is simply the process of freeing up the active compounds from the inert structural…

Fruiting body vs mycelium In Part One we delineated the two primary parts of a fungi, the fruiting body, aka the mushrooms, and the mycelium, the “roots” of the fungi. For a more detailed look at anatomy of a mushroom see the diagram below) Why is this delineation so important when it comes to mushroom supplements? And why does Mushroom…

Fruiting body vs. Mycelium We certainly live in interesting times… this is especially true for us mushroom lovers. While humans have been using mushrooms for thousands of years, associating them with everything from fairies to gods to immortality to health supporting allies, we are fortunate today to be experiencing a renaissance of sorts for mushrooms. Modern science and traditional wisdom…

Over the last 5 years, we are finally awakening to the wonderful health supporting gifts of functional mushrooms and have seen a growing awareness and interest in their use here in the U.S. While new to us, mushrooms have been highly prized in Asia for hundreds of years, several of which are considered to be the highest level of remedies,…