‘The Mushroom Lady’ continued

    “So how does one become ‘The Mushroom Lady’ at the Farmers Market?” you may ask.  For Linda Mansfield and her partner, Victor Helstrom, of Mushrooms, Herbs, Preserves, Inc., the odyssey began in December of 2006 with some incidental information about another mycologist downstate. They were ready to take their lives in a new direction and an idea took root. Their subsequent investigation into the fresh and dried mushroom trade took them first to the bookstore to read several “How-to” books, then to Newport to visit with Andrew Smith who was featured prominently in the previously mentioned information, and finally, to their basement to experiment with “fruit packs” usually purchased by folks who just want to dabble with growing their own mushrooms.
    Many people would have picked some fruiting bodies, sautéed them in butter for a good steak dinner, and deposited the spent substrate on the compost heap … end of story. Linda and Victor are not many people. Since their early enterprise producing their own commercially available fruit packs, they have built a lab to enable them to generate, sterilize and inoculate their own culture, spawn, and substrate. They have in place incubators, an autoclave, a flow hood, instrumentation, refrigeration, growing racks, a mister on a timer, everything needed to control temperature, air circulation, and humidity to meet the needs of shitake and oyster mushrooms at all stages of life.
    “A controlled environment eliminates the need for spraying [pesticides],” Linda states flatly. They are now in the planning stages of a new, all-in-one building for their enterprise.
    As anyone who has operated a business can tell you, producing a great product is not enough. One must convince consumers that they need the product. Linda puts her marketing plan in simple terms … ”Knowledgeable eaters seek flavor.”
    Fresh mushrooms will keep for several days in a refrigerator and dried mushrooms will keep in a cloth bag or on the shelf “indefinitely” like spices or dried flowers. Drying intensifies the flavor and cooking imbues both types of mushrooms with a rich, nutty taste. Linda rattles off a half dozen mouthwatering suggestions … shitake mushrooms sautéed with onions and peppers … spicy seafood stew with oyster mushrooms … thickly sliced mushrooms fried in beer batter and dipped in hot pepper jelly (another product available from Mushrooms, Herbs, Preserves, Inc. at the Presque Isle Farmers Market). Last, though certainly not least, there is mushroom soup, rich, intensely gratifying, and completely not what is available in a can!
    Editor’s note: This weekly column is written by members of the Presque Isle Farmers’ Market. For more information or to join, contact their secretary/treasurer Steve Miller of Westmanland at 896-5860 or via e-mail at beetree@xpressamerica.net.