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Tag: reishi mushrooms

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What the Heck is a Tincture… and Why Should I Care?

BLUF: Tinctures are a great way to incorporate the power of fungi into your daily wellness routine. They are versatile, effective, and a quick, easy way to get important health benefits.
Try Texas Fungus tinctures and let us know what you think!

Mushroom tinctures are concentrated liquid extracts created by soaking fungi in a solvent—typically alcohol and/or water. These solvents separate the desired compounds from the mushrooms and leave you with a concentrated liquid packed with nutrients that can be dosed by the drop.

Mushroom tinctures are a convenient way to enjoy the benefits of medicinal mushrooms, such as *Reishi, *Chaga, *Lion’s Mane, *Cordyceps, and more. More than 100 species of medicinal mushrooms are used in Asia. These mushrooms have been used for thousands of years in traditional medicine and are now gaining popularity worldwide for their healing properties.

Some of the benefits of mushroom tinctures include:

– Boosting immune system function

– Reducing inflammation and oxidative stress

– Supporting brain health and cognitive function

– Enhancing energy and stamina

– Improving mood and stress response

– Promoting healthy skin and hair

– and many more!


How to Use Mushroom Tinctures for Optimal Results

Mushroom tinctures are very versatile and can be used in different ways depending on your needs and preferences. Here are some tips to get the most out of them:

– Take them sublingually (under the tongue) for faster absorption into the bloodstream.

– Start with a low dose (about 10 drops) and gradually increase it until you find your sweet spot. The recommended dose varies depending on the type of mushroom, but generally ranges from 20 to 60 drops per day.

– Take them in the morning or afternoon for an energy boost or in the evening for relaxation.

– Mix them with water, juice, tea, coffee, smoothies, or any other beverage of your choice. – Experiment with different combinations of mushrooms to create your own custom blends.

Mushroom tinctures are a great way to incorporate the power of fungi into your daily wellness routine. They are versatile, effective, and a quick, easy way to get important health benefits.
IMPORTANT: It is always a good idea to consult with a healthcare professional before adding any new supplements to your diet. Please see our disclaimer below.

What Makes Texas Fungus Tinctures Special?
Texas Fungus Mushroom Tinctures are made from 100% Mushroom Fruiting Body, and processed using a Dual-Extraction Technique.

All of our mushrooms are grown directly in-house, or wild-foraged in the US.

To create our tinctures, we first dry and powder the fruiting body of each mushroom to increase the available surface area for the extraction process.
Next we begin the Alcohol Extraction by soaking the mushroom powder in 120 proof (60%) Sugarcane Alcohol for a minimum of 2 weeks.

When completed, the alcohol extract is filtered off, and then the mushroom powder is simmered in hot water (~200F) for a minimum of four hours. This solution is then filtered again to remove the mushroom powder, and the Hot Water Extract is cooled to room temperature, so it can then be mixed in a 1:1 ratio with the sugarcane Alcohol Extract to create the final product that will then be bottled up.

All of our tinctures are 30% alcohol (by volume) in their final state making them fully shelf-stable and ready to be mixed in any beverage or taken sublingually.


Click below to learn more about each tincture’s individual benefits and to try them to see how they can improve your health and happiness!

Texas Fungus Tinctures and Benefits

Blends

Rise  

Revive

Super Blend

Singles

Chaga

Reishi

Lion’s Mane

Turkey Tail

Maitake

Cordyceps


References:

  1. Wachtel-Galor S., Yuen J., Buswell J.A., Benzie I.F.F. (2011). Ganoderma lucidum (Lingzhi or Reishi): A Medicinal Mushroom. In: Benzie I.F.F., Wachtel-Galor S., editors. Herbal Medicine: Biomolecular and Clinical Aspects. 2nd edition. Boca Raton (FL): CRC Press/Taylor & Francis; 2011. Chapter 9. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK92757/
  2. Park Y.K., Lee H.B., Jeon E.J., Jung H.S., Kang M.H. (2005). Chaga mushroom extract inhibits oxidative DNA damage in human lymphocytes as assessed by comet assay. Biofactors, 21(1-4), 109-112. https://doi.org/10.1002/biof.552210120
  3. Mori K., Inatomi S., Ouchi K., Azumi Y., Tuchida T. (2009). Improving effects of the mushroom Yamabushitake (Hericium erinaceus) on mild cognitive impairment: a double-blind placebo-controlled clinical trial. Phytotherapy Research, 23(3), 367-372. https://doi.org/10.1002/ptr.2634
  4. Standish L.J., Wenner C.A., Sweet E.S., Bridge C., Nelson A., Martzen M., Novack J., Torkelson C. (2008). Trametes versicolor mushroom immune therapy in breast cancer. Journal of the Society for Integrative Oncology, 6(3), 122-128
  5. Chen S., Li Z., Krochmal R., Abrazado M., Kim W., Cooper C.B. (2016). Effect of Cs-4® (Cordyceps sinensis) on exercise performance in healthy older subjects: a double-blind, placebo-controlled trial. Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine, 16(5), 585-590. https://doi.org/10.1089/acm.2009.0226
Disclaimer: The information or products mentioned in this article are provided as information resources only, and are not to be used or relied on to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. This information does not create any patient-doctor relationship, and should not be used as a substitute for professional, medical diagnosis and treatment. The statements made in this article have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Any products mentioned are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. The information in this article is intended for educational purposes. The information is not intended to replace medical advice offered by licensed medical physicians. Please consult your doctor or health practitioner for any medical advice and prior to starting, adding, adjusting or stopping any health related product, supplement, etc.
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How We Grow ‘The Best Damn Mushrooms in Texas’

BLUF: We grow high-quality mushrooms in a carefully designed 7-step process, perfected over 6 years of trial, error, education and experimentation. 
Let our hard work pay dividends to you: try the ‘Best Damn Mushrooms in Texas’ and let us know how we’re doing!

  1. Strain Selection: The Team looks for the best growing strains for each species from around the globe. Once we identify great strains for in house commercial production viability, we verify if those strains will be viable for us. Not all are, so we run some small 40 substrate bag test batches. Once we get a trend of 3 positive results, then we determine what growing medium or substrate will be best suited for that strain.


  2. Substrate Production: This is kind of our secret sauce. We use a 2-yd batch mixer with a controllable water flow meter so we can use a very precise substrate recipe using a mushroom friendly amount of micro and macro nutrients. This allows us to customize substrate ingredients down to 0.01 of a pound.

    Once we get the substrate bagged up in our “custom unicorn bags”, we then cook them in our very own steam box made from Mild Steel, Stainless steel, and Aluminum which is also powder-coated.

3. Inoculation: Once each batch of 200 substrate blocks has cooked, we inoculate them based on which species matches up to its desired substrate recipe.
For our pre-lab protocol, we utilize LSD:
Lint roll your clothes,
Spray down with 70% Isopropyl,
Dip your feet in the bleach bath.
When inoculating, we pour the spawn from bag to bag ensuring that we don’t touch any of it. Spawn is extremely sensitive and must be treated with the highest priority. Without spawn, no mushroom farm exists.

4. Incubation: This is where the mycelium is consuming the new mushroom food that we just introduced to it in the lab. The majority of the growth is done in this room. We keep the Incubation room at 63F to 65F in order to not go over 70F internal temperature inside each bag. Consistency is crucial in this step and often overlooked. If your Incubation room isn’t dialed-in, you will have mixed results.

5. Fruiting: After the substrate blocks have finished incubating, we introduce the blocks to fruiting conditions that are cold, wet, and turbulent air. Generally we keep our fruiting rooms between 60F and 65F. This cuts down on any other bacterial mold spores in the air (there’s Billions of them!) and colder grow rooms usually result in higher quality mushrooms.

We also harvest by trimming any unwanted substrate off the block with a razor utility knife. We want to give you mushrooms! Not un-edible, myceliated sawdust chunks. They don’t taste that great and get stuck in your teeth.

6. Cold Storage: After harvesting, the mushrooms have an internal temperature called “Field Heat” ( usually around 70F)  in which we need to refrigerate the mushrooms to knock off the field heat, begin the cold chain delivery process, and get the internal temperature down to 34F to 38F.

7. Delivery: Between 2 farmer’s markets, a couple grocery stores, our restaurant clients, and anytime you pickup at the farm, a Texas Fungus team member will be the one passing these delicious mycelium morsels into your hands. We always recommend keeping them refrigerated until you get ready to cook them.

Please make sure to always cook your mushrooms thoroughly; we have recipes available if you need some mushroom inspiration!

To go deeper into the process, learn more or chat about how you can achieve similar results, click here to schedule a chat or consultation.

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Why OUR Shrooms?

BLUF (bottom line up front): ‘The Best Damn Mushrooms in Texas’ isn’t just a clever tag line – it’s a fact based on the quality of our products, the expertise of our farmers, and the effectiveness of our processes. Texas Fungus is a brand you can trust.

Don’t take our word for it though, see for yourself and let us know what you think!

Reason 1: Quality and Consistency

Whether it’s our tinctures, our equipment and machinery, our processes or the star of the show, our actual mushrooms, we take deep pride in what we do and HOW we do it. We go above and beyond what is the minimum standard, beyond what is just ‘required’, and always beginning with the end in mind.  

Always. Every time. 

We do not sacrifice quality for the sake of profit. 

Case in point: Our tinctures are made using 100% whole fruiting body of mushrooms, no filler materials ever. And all TF mushrooms are trimmed, always. This means we trim off the substrate so you get only mushroom, no fluff. Period!

We do not sacrifice quality because we get busy. 

We do not sacrifice quality if we’re in the middle of a growth period and short on staff.

We NEVER sacrifice quality. 

If we have to delay an order being shipped to you, our incredible fungus family, we will – if it means you’ll be getting the best product, at the level you deserve. Because at the end of the day, none of this exists without YOU!

This passion for top-notch shrooms and shroom products means you’ll consistently get the highest quality possible when you purchase from Texas Fungus. 

Always. Every time.


Reason 2: Expertise of our Farmers

All Texas Fungus farmers are personally trained by me (Jordan) the founder. Not only to create consistency in practice and knowledge base among staff, but also because it is my aim to cultivate a culture of passion for what we do. I want every farmer and TF teammate to get just as jazzed about shrooms as I do – well, my level might not be realistic for everyone, but as close to it as possible 🙂.

I have dedicated years of my life and, at this point, millions of hours to becoming a fungus master. Of course, there is always something new to learn – one of the things I love about fungi – and I’m always striving to gain more knowledge. 

But when it comes to the ‘Super 6’ (our term for the 6 TF staple shrooms – 
Lion’s Mane 
Oyster
Maitake
Chaga 
Reishi
Cordyceps)
– we make it our mission to be the mushroom voice you can rely on.


Reason 3: Effectiveness of our Processes and Equipment

Just like a doctor who studies areas of the body around and connected to her area of practice, allowing her to make hidden connections and the most accurate diagnoses for her patients, so too do we study the connections between each step of the growing process and how it interacts with the specific type of mushrooms we grow. 

From the materials and machinery we use, like the type of bag Texas Fungus mushrooms are grown in or the custom steam box we built, to the quality and consistency of our selected suppliers, the difference made by something as seemingly small as the color of the bag or the ingredients in the substrate translates to hundreds in pounds harvested and thousands in revenue.

If you’re a grower who would like to see how you could have similar results, reach out to schedule a consultation.

From a true passion for and dedication to our craft, to a carefully crafted 7-step growing process, we work hard every day to create products and mushrooms we are proud of; otherwise, for us, there’s really no point. Our aim: that Texas Fungus is a gourmet brand you can trust.

Passion before profit and quality over quantity.
Always. Every time.

Checkout TF in the media!

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How Texas Fungus Came to Be ‘The Best Damn Mushrooms in Texas’ (Our Origin Story)

BLUF (bottom line up front): Fungi is everything; at least for us.
And never let anyone stop you from pursuing your passions, no matter how wild they may seem 😉

Try our fungi and let us know how we’re doing!

I love food. I mean, who doesn’t love to eat – am I right?! No, but I REALLY love food. I love it the way some people love music. Or traveling. Or golfing; or football. Like I get an intense feeling of joy when I make, experience, or share great food with others. 

So, naturally, I got a culinary degree and started my career at some of the best restaurants in Dallas. 

I’ve worked with some of the greats – Chef Bruno Davallion,  Chef Kent Rathbun, Chef Chris Patrick, and Chef Daniel Burr – and this is where my appreciation and respect for mushrooms began. 

It started with food; but mushroomed (pun intended 😉 as my knowledge of fungi – and all the incredible things it can do for our bodies and our world – expanded. 
If you don’t know that the only reason life is able to exist and thrive on Earth is because of fungi, you’re missing so much. 

If you don’t know that fungi and mushrooms can truly save our planet and heal our bodies, then you need to check out our other post “Why Mushrooms?”. 

Fungi is everything. Period.
To me, at least. 

But back to the story… Well, fungi is, in fact, the story.
But how I arrived at that story, the story before the story, started in the kitchen.

A top-notch kitchen is run like a well-oiled machine, and not much differently than a military unit. There’s a lot of shouting, intensity and anxiety involved in producing impeccable plates. It can be challenging achieving a standard of perfection over and over for hours on end, day in and day out.

But it can also become a beautiful, flow-state of chaos with miraculous, delicious art born of that chaos. 
And when you work at high end spots such as Abacus or The Mansion on Turtle Creek, part of the resulting art of that beautiful process is the mushroom.

The mushroom can be the cherry on top –  finishing a fantastic dish with the perfect artistic pop! Or it can be the base – the foundation of a soup or creamy sauce, or the foundation of a house itself…
Yes, there really are people building houses with spent mushroom substrate!

Mushrooms can be almost anything. They are amazing, full stop. 

As I discovered the diversity and versatility of fungi in the kitchen, I also started learning the value of its flavor profiles. Just like a good wine, mushrooms can bring out magic when paired correctly.
From there, the nutritional knowledge and how shrooms can positively impact our health, also developed. The more I learned about mushrooms, and then fungi, the more in awe I became.

As this passion intensified, and as my understanding of the restaurant scene in DFW developed, I realized there was a real need. 

Not only were restaurants searching for a top-notch, local supplier they could count on for delicious, gourmet mushrooms, but the DFW community was also in need of the healing properties fungi could provide –
whether that be through incorporating higher-quality fresh mushrooms into their diets, or through the use of trustworthy, quality fungi products such as tinctures, powders, or even growing equipment for our grower friends. 

I started looking for this high-quality, local supplier, and then it dawned on me: this was a real opportunity to live my passion.
The needed supplier could be me.

During my time working as a chef in Dallas, I had gone back to college and was working toward a finance degree. This realization, no, this calling – that I was meant to be a mushroom farmer – came to me in my second to last semester of that degree at UTA in 2016,
and Texas Fungus was born. 

Imagine how it sounded to my parents when I said:
“Guess what, guys? I’m quitting school with only 1 semester left to be a mushroom farmer instead”! 

Yeah… everyone definitely thought I had lost it for a while.

I continued anyway. 

When everyone said “Who’s going to buy enough mushrooms to make a whole business out of that?!”, I continued. 

Without a farm, I continued. 

Without money to start the business, I continued. 

When I couldn’t find proper suppliers or the materials and equipment I needed, I created what I needed instead; and I continued.

What started as a garage-sized project in Dallas Uptown producing 30-40 lbs/week quickly expanded into a full-scale operation growing over 500 lbs of mushrooms weekly by February 2020, largely fueled by restaurant orders.

When the pandemic hit, our restaurant accounts tanked.
Doing business the way we had been up to this point wasn’t possible anymore, and we almost went under. So many hardworking food industry professionals lost everything. 

But we pivoted and innovated – we created new products and expanded into new markets; and I continued. 

I had to fight, and fight, and work, and work, and work – 70-80 hour weeks for the last 5 years straight to build and sustain this company.
Day and night, living and breathing mushrooms – literally. (always wear a respirator!)

And I would do it all over again because I know what we are producing is needed, is valuable, and can actually make a difference in people’s lives. 

From growing just one type of fresh mushroom in those early days,
producing only tens of pounds,
to now growing a thousand pounds of multiple varieties of mushrooms and selling top-notch products such as equipment and tinctures;
to say we’ve come a long way is an understatement.
I’m really proud of all we’ve accomplished and the high quality we provide.

But what matters most is where we’re headed; and we invite you along for the ride!

So… 
Subscribe to our blog;
Check us out on Facebook or Instagram;
Try your hand at growing your own shrooms. 
See the difference one of our tinctures could make for you; or
Schedule a visit to the farm. 

However you choose to join us on our fungus journey, we’re glad you’re here. As a token of appreciation, use this special code TFORIGIN20 for 20% off your order – and welcome to the Texas Fungus (TF) family!

Sincerely,
Jordan
Texas Fungus Head Mushroom Farmer, Founder and CEO

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