The best hand crafted
American wild-gathered
artisinal, medicinal mushroom
products ~ at any price!
Preparation
The only source mushrooms for our products are the wild fungi personally gathered on private lands within the Catskill forest preserve of New York State. The questionable raw material we find on the internet, particularly from the former, and post Chernobyl, Soviet Union, makes us cautious; particularly in terms of offering these to people with compromised immune systems. There may be some advantages to "farming" mushrooms but we feel this further separates the product from natural sources and potentially introduces contaminants, so we do not engage in any form of "farming" of our source mushrooms. We harvest our mushrooms conservatively, with regard to the preservation of the species, some of which, particularly Chaga, are slow growing and relatively scarce.
Basically the preperation of all of our extracts involves the following steps. After finding and gathering, (sometimes a lengthy and frustrating processs), we engage in:
Drying
After separating and removing the inevitable debris (in the form of twigs leaves and bark) from the harvested product, we spread the material on porcelain coated steel trays, in the sun until they reach a satisfactory level of dryness. We again manually/visually sort the dried material and store it for a short time in brown paper bags; this gives us another opportunity to remove extraneous material.
Grinding
Both extraction and capsule filling require the material to be reduced to a powder. We do this by either breaking the material down to a manageable size. In the case of Chaga we crush the material in a granite motar. For Turkey Tail and Reishi, we slice/dice it then perform a slow-speed grind it in a manually operated "grain" mill.
The Water
Working in the "country", we are fortunate to have our own drinking-water well, totally separated from any municipal source. But we do not use this water in the preparation of our decoctions (water extractions). Rather, we use water from a nearby deep sourced artesian well that, according to local "wisdom", was used in pre-Dutch colonial days, by the native inhabitants of the area. We gather and store this water in clear glass demijohns in preparation for use.
The Alcohol
Other information sources advise the use of hi-proof vodka or non-organic spirits for use in making tinctures. These are less expensive and possibly useable extraction media, but we use only certified organic/ non- GMO, sugarcane alcohol in the preparation of our tinctures.
We provide this information in the hope that some of our readers will prepare their own extractions/capsules and blends. Do not hesitate to contact us if you desire guidance in this area.