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Did any of you discover the true nature of our mystery object? Was it an old loaf of bread? A roasted marshmellow? A moldy chunk of cheese? None of the above. It was Caddie's favorite birthday present - a shiitake mushroom log! She is enamoured with fungi and has spent much time hunting and identifying mushrooms. The one thing we have not been brave enough to do is gather and eat wild mushrooms. A good friend of mine told me a story of how her grandfather's family in France regularly went on mushroom hunts and prepare
d the results. One time it resulted in intoxication and uncontrolled laughter! :-) We were tempted to try to cueillir a few from our woods, but . . . I just couldn't do it.Enter the Shiitake mushroom kit. It was so much fun! It arrived tightly wrapped in a bag. Step 1 - open bag, remove log (no, it doesn't smell bad), rinse for 15 seconds and replace in bag. Step 2 - put it in an out of the way place for a few days. Step 3 - take log out of bag and place on the sponge (included) in a saucer or cake pan. You can see the little mushroom buttons already! Fill saucer with 1/4-3/4 in wa
ter, tent with perforated bag (included) and mist daily. Voila! After the buds appear the mushrooms were ready to harvest in 4-7 days.It was so exciting to see them grow and then for Caddie to be able to cut and saute them herself! According to the producer, th
e log should produce 10-16 oz of mushrooms in two or more flushes (crops). The only problem is that the shiitakes are SO delectable that our little white button mushrooms from Kroger can
't compare. I highly recommend trying your hand at raising mushrooms. It would be an entertaining Christmas present. Yum!-- Marjorie
4 comments:
That looks like tons of fun, and delish to boot!!
My kids have also suddenly become interested in mushrooms. We're planning on ordering a mushroom growing kit, but haven't yet.
How old is Caddie, btw? My 7 yo dd sounds a lot like her! She is a budding naturalist, too, and it sounds as if your field guides and ours would make quite a set! ;-)
Angel,
Caddie just turned 10. It is hard to believe. We chose the kit I linked too for several reasons, one being that the Wall Street Journal did a feature on mushroom kits last year and liked this one best :-) It was really fun.
This is so neat! I was fixing to place my guess as something found on the beach. I thought those were little seashells on the side of it.
Thanks for the link. I will have to remember this.
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