Discover exciting new mushrooms… whether you buy them, grow them or forage for them in the wild.

There’s never been a better time to be a mushroom lover!

It used to be that nobody cared much about mushrooms.

If you went to your local store, or even a large supermarket, you’d likely have found only the common Button mushrooms, and maybe some Portabella.

Grow your own mushrooms? Only if you were a hard-core fungi lover.

Forage for mushrooms in the wild? Again, this was open only to small groups of wild mushroom lovers, who pretty much kept to themselves.

But times are changing!

There are now plenty of places to buy mushrooms, and home grow kits are making it easy for anyone to get started growing their own.

Best of all, mushroom foraging groups are sprouting up everywhere, and encouraging newcomers to join them in the woods.

Good times!

Buy fresh mushrooms in local stores and supermarkets.

Shiitake, Portabella and Oyster mushrooms on display in a local store.

When I go to my nearest supermarket, they now have many more mushrooms on display than they did even a year ago.

I can get the usual Button and Portabella mushrooms, of course. But I can also find Shiitake mushrooms, Oyster mushrooms and sometimes Enoki mushrooms too.

The only thing I’d recommend is that you take a close look at the mushrooms before you buy. Make sure they’re fresh.

Among wild mushrooms, the Shiitake last about a week after harvesting, so long as you keep them in the fridge. Most other wild mushrooms have a shorter shelf life.

Also, don’t be shy about buying packages of dried mushrooms. They’re less expensive and can be stored indefinitely.

It’s tempting to think that dried mushrooms are somehow second best. But that’s not really the case. Some professional chefs actually prefer to use dried mushrooms in some dishes. They say the flavors are more concentrated and rich.

Better still, find fresh mushrooms at a local farmers’ market.

Over the last few years there has been a huge growth in the launch of small, local mushroom farms.

Entrepreneurs are building their own, small-scale operations and selling through farmers’ markets and small stores.

Growing and selling locally makes perfect sense, because most mushrooms don’t travel or store well. This gives start-ups a wonderful opportunity to build their own mushroom-growing operation, and sell to the local community.

And, of course, this works really well for mushroom lovers, because we can find a wide variety of super-fresh mushrooms close to home.

Or grow your own mushrooms at home.

A Shiitake mushroom home grow kit... with the mushrooms almost ready to harvest.

It used to be that practically nobody grew their own mushrooms. It was pretty much unheard of.

But with the recent renaissance of interest in mushrooms and their benefits to our health, that has changed.

Interest in mushroom grow kits really exploded during the pandemic lockdown. It’s like people were looking for fun family projects they could do with their kids. Let’s grow mushrooms on the kitchen counter!

We have a whole page devoted to growing your own mushrooms at home.

If you like to walk in the woods, go foraging for wild mushrooms.

Some mushrooms you can buy in stores or in markets. Others you can grow at home.

But there are some mushrooms that are really hard to find unless you go out and look for them yourself, in person.

Beside which, hunting for mushrooms in the woods adds a whole new layer of experience to being a mushroom lover.

As a mushroom forager, you can become a true fungi enthusiast… expanding your awareness as you consider how everything in the forest is connected via a mycelial network that lives and grows under every step you take.