Hello there!👋
This is the Spira Farms newsletter. Where eating 1oz of microgreens = eating 3-6 pounds of the adult-vers…whoops that’s my sales pitch habit we just talk about cool local food stuff here.
Today we are going to talk about:
- Mushroom Farm! 🍄
- N E W Product!
Mom, where do mushrooms come from? 👶
Last week, I was in the hospital all week with my parents. 🏥
Everything is fortunately okay now! But I remember despite the stress how excited my parents were about the above picture of those Oyster mushrooms. They showed them to all the doctors and nurses that came to check in on us (and continue to do so). It was a really exciting experience that they got to see a mushroom farm in person. I want to give a little bit of that excitement to you today.😎
Before getting into this line of work, I had NO idea where mushrooms came from or how they are grown. You can’t go to the store to buy mushrooms seeds because that’s not really a thing. Mushrooms do not have seeds. 🤔
I was given a tour of the Windy City Mushroom factory with my dad last week, and this time I received the tour from the mad scientist of mushroom growing Matt (hes not mad hes incredibly cool but hes also a mad scientist 👨🔬). Matt was self taught from his father how to grow mushrooms, and is now in charge of growing thousands of pounds of mushrooms a day. Matt gave us an in depth tour of HOW to grow mushrooms because its incredibly weird.
Mushrooms do not have seeds. Creating mushrooms feels like a college chemistry classroom. You have a petri dish that has something that resembles bacteria or mold growing in it. You take that dish, cut it up like a pie and put it into perfect conditions and bam suddenly some mushroom pop up a few weeks later after a bit of more attention. Basically all the mushrooms we eat are clones.
Above is a mushroom called Reishi, this mushroom is more medicinal rather than something we add to our dinner plate. However, look at that bag it is in. The bag it a mixture of wood and grain initially. After you add the mushroom baby (I have no idea what you call the mushroom predecessor just roll with it.) to the bag of wood and grain, the mushroom eats it and grows. All of that white stuff in the bag IS the mushroom. The fruit of the mushroom is what you see on top of the bag. Most mushrooms basically follow this similar process with a few caveats.
What’s incredible about mushrooms is that they are in an enclosed bag most of their life. All of the water, and food they need is within the bag. The bag is there to trap the water and create humidity for the mushrooms. After giving the mushroom time to grow in a bag, they eventually cut the bag open with a knife. When that happens, the mushroom will grow its fruit wherever the bag was opened. Another cool thing I loved is that the waste of the mushroom the wood and grains is also not just thrown out, but used as a mulch later. Really cool stuff, I plan on making a video to better showcase the experience. It’s really weird, really cool, and really fun. 🤓
NEW PRODUCT AVAILABLE.
Wheatgrass
We’re eating healthy, what about our furry loved ones?
It’s called wheatgrass, or pet grass, or cat grass or whatever else they use to market it. Thing is, it’s usually marketed for pets because humans don’t have strong enough stomachs to digest it. You can give this stuff to your pet live, they can mow it down and then you can water it and let it regrow again. We are selling the wheatgrass uncut, and in the soil.
Wheatgrass is used by humans too, but with extra steps. I actually will cut it up and dehydrate it, powder it, and add it to my smoothies. You could also juice it too but it’s way easier I find to dehydrate it by simply putting it into an oven for a bit, and then use my coffee grinder to make it dust. ☕
Wheatgrass is available now on our website. Let’s give our pets the same love we give ourselves. ✌