Georgia November

November here in Georgia has been gorgeous.  The trees have graced our yard with their beauty for longer this year than any I remember. The temps, until today,  have been perfect.  I get spoiled and am truly surprised when the weather has the audacity to bring a chill of 30 degrees.  So now reality sets in and I feel winter on its way.  Not a fan of winter, I will have to stock up on long sleeve shirts, thick trousers and replace the boots my dog Belle chewed up last night.  However, once prepared I can brave the cold and enjoy my beautifully wild yard.

This is the barn we are transforming into a grow room. 

View from the deck

We've been to Mulberry St. Farmers' Market on Tatnall Square in Macon.  The produce, meat and goat cheese vendors are remarkable.  I feel honored to be a part of this market.  This past Wednesday we sold out of Shiitake in an hour.  I actually had a line waiting to buy.  Another first for Shiitake Village.  I love the people involved in the market including the customers.  It's really the only way to shop.  It's so much more fun than the grocery store.

This was our first time at Tatnall.  We still didn't have a tent, so sold out of the truck. That's me setting up.

View across the Square.

Organic Log Shiitake

The month of October sped through my life like a freight train.  I did notice the absolutely perfect weather and took advantage of it whenever I could be outside.  And outside is where I found myself among the gorgeous, plump shiitake that graced our logs in abundance.

Everyday I harvested pounds upon pounds of my favorite mushroom.  Cooking new dishes with shiitake became a learning experience that ultimately made me feel like a gourmet chef.  But what to do with the other 50 pounds?  This being my first year in business, I had to scramble to figure out how to market these beauties.  I went down to the Courthouse Market an extra day, but that didn't help much so I signed up to attend two other markets.  One on Tattnall Square in Macon and the Bolingbroke market in Bolingbroke.  This was not enough, I still had too many so I went to East Atlanta, found a wonderful neighborhood chocked full of independent restaurants that bought local produce when they could.  Urban Cannibals, an organic and vegan restaurant bought 5 pounds and Cal, the owner, even tried to hook me up with other chefs around town.  We are checking out Bolingbroke tomorrow.  I'll let  you know how it goes.
Our logs are now sleeping for a while, so we'll ramp up our indoor production and continue to discover how and where to sell them.  Wish us luck.

New Strain a Success

While I'm waiting for the milo to dry so we can make some more grain spawn, I have to celebrate this past Saturday.  We finally were blessed with enough mushrooms to take to the Courthouse Square Market in McDonough.

It's a great place to be on any day of the week, but we'll be selling with the other vendors on Saturdays. There's a great little restaurant that serves all kinds of goodies along with vendors of vegetables, eggs, boiled peanuts, baked goods and crafts of all kinds not to mention the different flavored beers on sale.  There is also a booth that is all things honey, yum.  Want to pamper your pet?  There are organic made treats available as well as cute accessories for the special dog in your life.  

I had a great time selling my mushrooms and hope our new strain from Aloha Medicinals will come through for this Saturday as well.  We loved our huge. meaty shiitake but the new strain delivers small, tender mushrooms easy to cook with.  

We're working hard to establish quality and quantity and we're getting there slowly but surely.  We love what we do and hope to be the source of locally, naturally grown Shiitake mushrooms.  Hopefully later this fall we'll be able to deliver oyster mushrooms as well.

Like I Said

Still working on the fence.  It looks good so far.  We even have the gate up across the driveway.  It's exciting to see the end to this project.  Maybe two more weeks.  Belle is learning her boundaries and hasn't gotten into much trouble.  Just eating things she shouldn't and chewing on things not hers.

On the mushroom side of things, we're really trying to figure out a year-round cycle for producing the Shiitake and oysters.  We really have to get with our suppliers and just have them send what's needed at the right times.  We're also cloning and creating our own spawn so that should help some.

When we do get Shiitake in, we hope to sell downtown. The last flush just 10 days ago got dehydrated and sent out to mom, Jim and Ava and Aunt Alice to thank them for their support of our endeavor. It was fun to create the packaging and mailing labels for the company.  I also made a rack card for when we go to farmers markets.  This whole marketing gig is new to me.

Fences

I never thought that of all the things I have experienced in my life I would add pulling fence to the list.  We want to keep our big dog Belle from roaming the neighborhood.  Lately, at 7 months old, Belle has decided to be real friendly and visit the neighbors around us.  But her way of greeting is barking and running circles around you. With her size and looks it can be very intimidating.  So bottom line we need to keep Belle from TERRORIZING the neighborhood.  Vic and I purchased wire fencing and fence posts and this weekend put up fence along one side of our property, 330 feet worth.  Whew.  Fencing the rest of our two acres is going to be quite a job.  So hold on neighbors, it may be a long month.

Shiitake Logs

Who would have thought our Shiitake would decide to flush in mid July but here they are.  We expected them in October.

I got enough this morning to plan for dinner.  These are much smaller than the ones we grow indoors, but just as tasty.

Our Shiitake Village www.kickstarter.com project will be over in 4 days.  So far 20 people have backed us on Kickstarter for a total of $794.00.  Way less than the $5500 we were trying to get but an awesome turn-out nevertheless.

Vic is being his inventive self again.  We sought advice from our very brilliant sister-in-law, Ava, Associate professor Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience, UofW, Milwaukee.  We wanted to know how her lab kept everything sterile.  She suggested a germicidal UV light.  So Vic found a
GermGuardian,GG1000 Pluggable UV-C Air Sanitizer with Odor Reduction and mounted it in our glove box.  I'll let you know how it goes.

Just Thinking - Probably too Much

We hoped when we started the Shiitake Village project on https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/128992244/expanding-shiitake-village that we could get people especially in Georgia excited about Georgia grown and made products.  I was hoping that if we actually were backed that it would be in the local papers.  This would maybe get people to thinking that locally grown and made products are something to be very proud of.  That people would begin encouraging others to do the same and build some community pride here in Henry county.

I visited the local farmers market held on Thursdays from 10 to 2.  I talked to many who had booths, some for homemade aprons and bags, organic soaps and skin care products, jellies, jams, and of course  produce.  When I think of a market place I picture crowds of people bustling about buying their fruits and veggies etceteras, excitedly chattering and comparing of ideas.   But in actuality it was like walking into a funeral.  Not many customers, not many happy merchants.  I made it my job for the 30 minutes I stayed to converse with and truly show interest in what and who was there.  I bought some awesome homemade soap made with tons of oils and herbs and a few delicious peaches.  After all, you can't be in Georgia and not eat a darn good peach.

It would be tremendous if people everywhere, not just here and there, returned to the earth and really cared about community.  Too many of our brothers and sisters have left this earth, their minds lost in cyber space.  But I digress.  I can only hope that with my interest and others as well this farmers market can blossom.

It does take a village.  I just want to be part of it.

Now on a happier note:
We continue to improve our methods for growing shiitake and getting much cleaner.  I didn't realize it took such cleanliness to grow fungi successfully but the shiitake seem happier for it.  Have you hugged a shiitake today?  I have.

More pics of the ones I hold most dear to my heart.

HOT

It's hot and humid in Georgia, but we still managed to add to our mushroom shelves.  We are up to 65 inoculated bags of Shiitake.  They take 2 -3 months before first fruit so September should be a busy month.
 Kids had vacations recently so I have to post at least one picture of the grandkids. The grand dog is Pearl.

Fourth of July

I hope everyone had a great 4th. Perhaps had a little gratitude moment for our country and the men and women who fight for our freedom and way of life.  I'm guilty lately of complaining way too much about the insanity going on in D.C. and elsewhere around the USofA and the world.  Recently I spent time with my grandson for his 1st birthday and was able to put my fears for this country and the world aside and thank God for family and friends.  Who could possibly resist the smile and giggle of a one year old.

A little gratitude goes a long way.  

Shiitake Village update.  Many people have donated money to our Kickstarter project.  All we need is 100 more people to donate $50 each or 200 people at $25 each etc.  Seriously, this has been fun and motivating for me.  We're working hard and have 40 bags in various stages of production and  so much more to do.  

Enjoying Shiitake

We have new babies popping up all over the place and growing fast.  These are our favorite eating mushroom above all others.  We're also waiting for a shipment of grain spawn to come so we can inoculate more sawdust substrate.  Pretty soon we should have about 50 more bags incubating.

We've had a slow start on Kickstarter.com but are so grateful to the people who have shown their support for Shiitake Village.  Some have donated with personal checks so, wow, many thanks. I am humbled by your generosity.

Dinner with Shiitake:

I sautéed the shiitake in olive oil with garlic, onion and a dash of worcestershire sauce.

Shiitake pinning

Our Shiitake blocks are pinning and in the grow environment.  We have Shiitake in bags as well and hope we have more Shiitake in another 2 weeks. It is getting harder to keep three environments going in the house, so for those of you who are supporting our efforts for a grow house, Thank You.  We also  got an email today from Kickstarter hailing us as a Kickstarter Staff Pick.  Vic did a super job on the video so

Kudos go to him.

Expanding Shiitake Village

We have the market for our mushrooms, and our bedrooms just aren't big enough anymore.    I guess it's  time to think about building a green house.  We have decided to try to raise the money through Kickstarter, a site where people can present their projects and hopefully raise the money they need.  We thought it was worth a try.  Go to Kickstarter.com and browse the projects.  It's a great concept.  Our project will be launched soon, so keep an eye out for it next week.

Shiitake - new strains

We're trying a new strain of Shiitake that all the mushroom people are raving about, and seeing great results.  In a couple months we should have pounds of shiitake.  Took a look at our logs we inoculated in November and the mycelium are showing themselves.  We're hoping when the weather gets cool again this fall we will see shiitake on our logs - the Shiitake Village I envisioned.

So much has happened since last post.  Our Pink, Golden and PoHu Oyster mushrooms flushed and I sold all of them to local chefs.  We are running out of space to grow mushrooms and hope to raise money to buy a green house.  There is a hungry market here in McDonough and hopefully we can meet the needs of this small community.

We went to Ashville NC to learn more about the mushroom business and had a very productive time.

Today I'm listening to the spitting of my pressure cooker sterilizing more substrate to inoculate with a new strain for us - Shiitake 75. Here are some pics of the mushrooms we sold.

Allow me to be totally un-PC when I say that we had a joyous day Sunday celebrating the resurrection of our Lord Jesus.  The absolutely gorgeous weather didn't hurt either.

This great spring weather is an added bonus, giving us the opportunity to try another experiment with golden oyster mushrooms, pink and pohu oysters.  This time we are pasteurizing wheat straw then layering straw and mushroom spawn in laundry baskets.  Pasteurizing takes up a lot of time due to the small scale equipment so only a small amount of straw is pasteurized at a time.  However, today we should be ready to inoculate 1 basket.  Then two to go.

Our King oyster mushrooms are fruiting.   Can't wait to harvest.  We also had some Wine Cap mushrooms show up in our yard.  We had planted them last fall.  Our first customer came yesterday to see our operation.  She really wanted Reishi mushrooms but I haven't ordered the spawn yet.  Reishi is purely medicinal especially for cancer, helping the immune system, and for problems with the liver.  I gave her our Wine Caps because she drove 50 miles to get here.    She seemed very happy with the Wine Caps.

We have lift off.

Wow, we have mushrooms.  Gray Dove oysters to be exact.  These are the first to fruit and we are delighted.  This was an experimental exercise in different substrate taken from books and off the internet.  Our supplier, Field and Forest from Wisconsin also sends directions and are available on line for the occasional panicked question.  So here are the fruits of our labors.  Aren't they adorable?

If anyone views this who has any suggestions on growing oysters after viewing the pictures, please feel free.  We need all the help we can get. Thanks.

April 6, 2014

Well we have a new member to our family.  We weren't anticipating this new addition, but couldn't turn away from the cutest puppy ever, with the exception of Phoebe of course.  We were under the impression that she was probably around 8 weeks old but found out at the vet that she was more like 6 weeks old.  She was dumped at the trucking school where my husband teaches and came to live with us that day.  Who could turn down a face like this.

Now she is 13 weeks old.

We've been told she may be an English Mastiff. Really?

One of the largest breeds on the planet? Well we love her anyway and are preparing for what life will 

be like with a big, huge, gigantic dog.  Fencing in the property is top priority.  She's a sweetie.

Mushroom News

On the Shiitake front we began inoculating substrate consisting of sawdust, wood chips, rice bran and  calcium carbonate.  They are incubating in the grow room and almost ready for fruiting.

We mix the ingredients in bags then sterilize in the pressure cooker.  After that we place the bags and spawn in the inoculation lab box to keep from exposing the substrate and spawn to contaminates.  About 2/3 cup of spawn is used per bag. The bags are sealed then placed

in the environmentally manipulated pods until ready for fruiting.

We're also growing oyster mushrooms on straw substrate inside bags.  We have to chop the wheat straw into small pieces - we used a garbage can and weed eater.  Then we soak the straw and for added measure we pasteurized the straw in a large pot, we used our pressure cooker pot for that. We placed the straw in bags and inoculated with grain spawn.  That's me in the background soaking the straw in hot water and dish liquid.

To have a little fun, I ordered a Lions Mane mushroom block that was ready to fruit.  We put it in with the other bags and watched it grow.

When it was big enough we cut it and ate it.  Most mushrooms do well sauteed with olive oil and garlic.

It was delicious.  

Until next time, Mary and Bob, bon appetit. 

Shiitake Village Taking Shape

Well already January 10. Where does the time go? Hope everyone is having a happy new year so far despite the weather. I can't believe we have the coldest winter ever in Georgia the year we decide to make our home into a farm. So let's hope we will see those pretty brown Shiitake late spring this year. Thankfully, our pipes did not burst. We know a lot of people who are dealing with that mess right now. We are slowly receiving all the equipment we ordered for our grow room. Vic has really put a lot of work into designing the environment. He constructed a glove box in order to inoculate the sterilized substrate blocks with shiitake spawn. We are waiting for the weather to warm up before our friends at Field and Forest in Wisconsin can send us the spawn safely. Meanwhile we have readied the special burner and pressure cooker to use for the sterilization of sawdust and wood chips to blend with rice bran and calcium carbonate to create the enriched growing blocks for the shiitake. Vic has built shelves and enclosed them in plastic sheeting. Each unit will have a fan, filter, misting system and drain. We haven't seen anyone create a sterile environment quite like this and hope that this will be sufficient to grow our shiitake. We had to use the back bedroom as a growing room but because the shiitake require 100% humidity at a certain stage for fruiting, we wanted to save the bedroom walls from the moisture, thus the enclosed shelf units. We are ready to start once we receive our shipment. If you do a search on the internet you will find People all over the world using whatever methods work best for them to grow their mushrooms. Here are a few pics of our endeavor.