Team Mushroom? It’s tempting

We found a morel in the garden!

(We think it’s a morel.*)

Yes, right here in Sunset’s test garden, dried up and shriveled and attached to a piece of fir bark mulch.

Sometimes you plan for One-Block projects; other times, they come toyou. See, we’d been thinking about ways to expand our hand-grown,handmade feast to include mushrooms for a while. For me, that had meantlingering gazes toward shiitake logs and tiny oyster mushroom farms. And then, we find a morel. It’s not enough for a feast, but it’s enough to get us thinking.

In theory, at least, growing one’s own mushrooms shouldn’t be that hard, if you’ve got wood inoculated with mushroom spores and a cool, dark spot where the magic can happen. Now, it’s just a matter of getting the right materials.

*At least, we think it’s a morel. It looks an awful lot like a morel. It doesn’t especially look like a false morel. That said, I’m so incredibly freaked about the idea of eating wild mushrooms that I have just kept it in my desk for almost a month, in an empty box of Lady Grey tea.

by Elizabeth Jardina, Sunset researcher