Appetizers

Hot Mushroom Dip

1 pound mushrooms, very finely chopped
1 stick butter or margarine, softened
1 tablespoon lemon juice
2 tablespoons minced onion
8oz or 1 pound sour cream
2 tablespoons chicken bouillon granules.
Chips, crackers or fresh round slices of cucumber.
optional - 4 strips of bacon fried crisp and crushed into bacon bits

1. Sauté mushrooms in a large frying pan on medium-high heat with 6 tablespoons of butter and lemon juice until soft.

2. Simmer for 5 to 10 minutes.

3. Add onion, sour cream, bouillon granules and salt and pepper and simmer for 5 to 10 minutes more.

4. Mix remaining butter, optional bacon bits and enough flour to make a paste to be used to thicken the dip

5. Add the paste to the hot mixture and stir until thickened.

6. Serve in hot serving plate with chips, crackers or fresh vegetables.

Soup

Asparagus and Mushroom Soup - Serves 4

1 tablespoon butter or margarine
3 green onions sliced thinly white and green parts
1/4 pounds oyster mushroom caps sliced
1 3/4 cups chicken broth
2 pounds of asparagus with 1/2 of root end sliced off.
1 cup milk
1/4 cup salsa
shredded cheese monterey jack or chedder
sea salt and pepper to taste.

1. Melt butter in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add the onions and mushrooms and sauté over medium-high heat for approximately 3-4 minutes.

2. Add chicken broth and the whole asparagus spears. Bring to a boil and simmer until asparagus is tender but not limp. Set aside the tips of 8-10 of the spears. Simmer until asparagus is very tender.

3. Transfer the broth and asparagus to a blender. Add the milk and salsa. Puree.

4. Return soup to pan and cook over medium heat until steaming hot. Add salt and pepper to taste.

5. Serve into 4 bowls and sprinkle with cheeze and garnish with the reserved aparagus tips.

Salad

1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
3 tablespoons olive oil or vegetable oil
1/2 cup minced scallions
1 teaspoon dijon mustard
1 teaspoon finely chopped fresh dill
sea salt and pepper to taste
1/2 pound mushrooms, quartered or sliced
1 pound green beans, sliced into 3 inch pieces.
1 cup sour cream
1 teaspoon lemon juice
handful of bacon bits
cherry tomatoes for garnish

1. Combine vinegar, oil, scallions, mustard, dill, salt and pepper in a jar and shake well to blend.

2. Put mushrooms in boiling water and cook 3-4 minutes. Remove mushrooms from water, transfer to a bowl, and pour dressing over them.

3. Put green beans in boiling water and cook until barely tender, approximately 8 minutes. Cool beans quickly by plunging them into ice water.

4. Add green beans to mushrooms. Add sour cream and mix thoroughly. Chill 2-4 hours.

5. Remove salad from refrigerator about 20 minutes before serving. Add additional seasoning if needed, and garnish with cherry tomatoes and bacon bits.

Nutrition

• Contain almost no fat and sodium.
• Have no cholesterol.
• Low in calories.
• The amino acid count in mushrooms is higher per serving than corn, peanuts, and kidney and soy beans.
• The vitamin content of mushrooms is actually similar to the vitamin content found in meat.
• Potassium: good for the heart, reduces the risk of high blood pressure and strokes. A Portabella usually has more than a banana.
• Copper: aids iron (also found in mushrooms) in making red blood cells and delivers oxygen to the body.
• Selenium: together with Vitamin E it produces antioxidants that neutralize "free radicals" which can cause cell damage.
• Riboflavin for healthy skin and vision.
• Niacin aids the digestive and nervous systems.
• Pantothenic acid helps with the nervous system and hormone production.
• Mushrooms have been used medicinally in China for more than 6,000 years.
• Gourmet mushrooms have antibacterial, anti-candida, anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, antitumor, and antiviral properties. Mushrooms also reduce blood pressure, moderate blood sugar, reduce cholesterol, enhance the immune system, and reduce stress. They are a kidney, liver, and nerve tonic. For 30 years, researchers have studied mushrooms' effectiveness against cancer. They found that mushrooms fight the following cancers: breast, cervical, uterine, colorectal, stomach, leukemia, liver, lung, lymphoma, melanoma, ovarian, pancreatic, prostrate, and sarcoma.

Facinating

• Louis XIV was one of the first mushroom growers growing 3,000 pounds of mushrooms a day. (Also Brad Kuhns of Top Shelf discovered he is a descendant of Louis XIV)
• Some mushrooms follow light like plants yet scientists still don't know how
• Mushrooms are comprised of 85-95 % water.
• Hieroglyphics from 4600 years ago feature mushrooms
• Mushrooms have their own immune system.
• Mushrooms are more closely related in DNA to humans than to plants.
• Most plants have a mycorrhizal relationship with fungus. The roots of the plants have a symbiotic relationship with the underground mycelium. Mycelium nourishes the plant's roots, and in trade, the plant transfers nutrients to the mycelium.
• The antibiotic penicillin was derived from the fungal species Penicillium.

These will blow your mind

• Some mushroom spores can dry and stay dormant for a century.
• Like human skin, mushrooms can produce vitamin D by being exposed to sunlight. In fact, exposing a freshly cut shiitake mushroom, gills up, to the sun for eight hours can increase its vitamin D content by as much as 4,600 times!
• Each mushroom cap has tens of millions of spores each theoretically capable of producing billions more mushrooms
• The Honey Mushroom (Armillaria ostoyae) is the world's largest known organism. This massive organism covers 2,384 acres (nearly four square miles) of soil in Oregon's Blue Mountains. The fungus is estimated to be 2,400 years old but could be as ancient as 8,650 years.
• Mycelium can use toxic substances such as oil, diesel and even e coli bacteria as a food source converting it into ... well ... mushrooms.
• Some mushrooms actually glow in the dark using a process called bioluminescence. In the past, people illuminated their way through the woods using these glowing pieces of fungus-colonized wood.
• Fungi produce antibiotics to fight off other microorganisms.
• Mushrooms have recently be discovered to use radiactivity as energy to make food and researchers are considering it for growing in long term space missions to convert cosmic radiation into food.
• One of the largest documented mushrooms was 10meters (33 feet)
• Mushrooms added to bandages are showing amazing promise in accelerating healing.
• Top Shelf Mushrooms grow-at-home Oyster Mushroom kits will produce mushrooms that can double in size in 1 day.

Order by phone: 1-705-888-0398

After your kits have finished producing mushrooms, people often ask us: "What do we do with it?"
The answer depends on which kit you have enjoyed. As with all outdoor culture, be sure the mushrooms you pick are the same you already harvested indoors as sometimes dangerous other species can invade.

Elm kits - Hypsizygus Ulmarius

You can add one of our Elm kits to your garden to actually boost the growth of your vegetables. A symbiosis is created with this species of mushroom between the mycelium and plant roots which can give you a dramatic increase in your vegetable yield. With the right conditions the mycelium from your kit will expand into straw and you'll enjoy additional outdoor crops later that year and/or in a following season. The kit adds mycorrhizae into your soil.

Instructions: We recommend you use one 5 pound Elm kit for about 15-20 pounds of straw (dry weight). This results in a spawning ratio of about 20-25%. Spread the straw out in a thin layer around your garden's plants or where you plan to plant your vegetables. Break up the Elm kit into crumbled chunks and spread them in clumps or like islands instead of being completely evenly spread. Then cover with more straw to retain moisture and create a sort of mycelium sandwich. Wet the bed with non-chlorinated water and engage in benign neglect (forgetaboutit). In 4-6 weeks you can peel back some of the straw to see if the mycelium took hold and expanded.

Oyster Pleurotus varieties and Shiitake Lentinula edodes kits

Oyster mushrooms are aggressive species and can be encouraged to proliferate outdoors producing even more yield. When the weather is not too hot or dry you can spread the mycelium of your finished oyster kit in wood chip piles, under log rounds, between scarred logs or even between layers of straw. We have a pile of wood pellets placed near a downspout from our eaves trough. The abundant water after a rain soaks one end of the wood pellet bed however the mycelium absorbs and transports moisture to the colonies that have been established from our expired kits.

Where our finished kits go to their final resting place ... or not!

You can also simply place your expired kit outdoors in a shady area leaving the bag still on it but cut the whole top off so the top face of the block is exposed. This provides some protection from insects, foreign competitors and traps in some moisture. Natural rain cycles or even morning dew can provide enough moisture to trigger bonus fruitings as this one expired blue kit shown above did.

We have also had some similar experiences with shaded shiitake blocks that provide extra surprises long after you thought all hope of another flush was lost.