What a great gift this is: self growing oyster mushrooms on coffee grounds And that ‘just’ from behind your kitchen counter. Fryslân Fungies is not only a fun and tasty gift idea, it also gives a different perspective on our food. Coffee grounds usually end up in the bin, but that's a real shame. Because it is hugely fertile. See how we grew beautiful oyster mushrooms in a month!
Sustainable and fun: grow your own oyster mushrooms with Fryslân Fungies
In cooperation with Fryslân Fungies
Together with the mushroom, the oyster mushroom is the best-known mushroom in the Netherlands. It has a flat, oyster-shaped cap on a small stalk, hence the name. The flesh of the oyster mushroom is soft and fleshy. Oyster mushrooms are not only healthy and primal Dutch, they are also perfect meat substitutes and that alone makes them sustainable. But there's more! Did you know that you can also grow your own mushrooms on coffee grounds that end up in the rubbish bin of most people and companies? A waste! Wander and Irene thought so too, which is why they came up with Fryslân Fungies, a recycled bucket with the right fungi with which anyone can grow their own oyster mushrooms. All you need is coffee grounds, a little water, patience and a lot of love. We got to work at home with a grow kit and saw for ourselves how extraordinary ‘the circle of life’ is.
From coffee grounds to oyster mushroom
We are looking forward to it! The grow kit will be delivered to our home by post. The grow kit consists of a bucket, a bag of spawn (kind of oyster mushroom seed) and instructions. It looks simple. is, yet it remains exciting. Will we succeed? On Instagram, I tell about this fun gift and it turns out that more people are familiar with the grow kit. Some followers have even managed to grow oyster mushrooms several times from one pot. We also get to work. Using the step-by-step plan below, we manage to welcome the first baby mushrooms within four weeks. After exactly one month, the oyster mushrooms are ready to be harvested.
Step-by-step plan: grow oyster mushrooms at home with help from Fryslân Fungies
I share below in steps how we went about it. This resulted in a beautiful harvest. As you can see from the photos below, it suddenly goes at lightning speed. Once the first mushrooms are visible, within four to five days you will have full-grown oyster mushrooms that you should also eat immediately, before they dry out. The photos were taken one day apart. On day five (main photo article at the top), we harvested the oyster mushrooms and ate them in a vegan pearl barley risotto. You can find this delicious vegan recipe here.
Growing your own oyster mushrooms on the kitchen counter. When the oyster mushrooms pop out of the bucket, you will have full-sized oyster mushrooms within five to six days.
Step 1: cleaning
Before we start working with coffee grounds, we clean the bucket (as instructed) thoroughly with boiling water. Good hygiene is important to avoid giving other fungi a chance.
Step 2: preparation
Wash your hands well and mix all the brood provided with the first fresh coffee grounds. Used coffee filters and pads may also be added. Close the lid and wait a few days. Following the instructions, place the bucket in a bright spot in the kitchen.
Step 3: adding coffee grounds
We keep a close eye on whether the coffee grounds are already turning white. After a few days, we see white clouds on the coffee grounds. We know from the instruction: if that happens, it is time to put a new layer of fresh coffee grounds in the bucket and to close the bucket again for a few days. Irene from Fryslân Fungies: ‘The coffee grounds may be the colour of dark chocolate, just make sure it stays well-wet. Try to give small amounts at a time and really loosen the coffee grounds chunks well. You know you are on the right track when a white layer comes on each time.’
We repeat this process until the bucket is filled to the brim with coffee grounds. In our case, it takes about three weeks before the bucket is completely full. It is best if you open the bucket as little as possible, at most every few days to check it. But we were so curious that we couldn't resist looking a little more often. This didn't harm the process thankfully. When the bucket was completely full, we stopped taking the lid off because we didn't want the project to fail.
Step 4: fungus formation
After about five weeks, we discover that the first oyster mushrooms break through the tape on the side. They do this themselves; you don't need to loosen the tape. And then it goes fast: every day we see the fungi grow exponentially. On the advice of Fryslân Fungies, we spray a little water on our baby mushrooms several times a day, so they stay nice and moist and don't dry out.
Step 5: harvesting
After five days, our fungi have grown. How do we know this? Because we have been tipped by Fryslân Fungies to pay attention to their structure. As soon as they stop growing and turn light brown, it is time to harvest and eat them quickly. Be quick though, because as soon as they are grown, the dehydration process also starts immediately. You harvest the fungi by turning them a quarter turn, which breaks them up. Are you too late and do you think you can already see some dehydration? Then put your fungi in water for a while. After harvesting, David fried the oyster mushrooms in rosemary and thyme to accompany a delicious risotto of pearl barley from Flevoland (on sale at Ekoplaza). Check out the recipe here.
Also delicious: oyster mushrooms in beer batter with an Asian twist.
Cooking with oyster mushrooms from its own cultivation, it became a pearl barley risotto.
Growing the best oyster mushrooms
How many oyster mushrooms you will get is difficult to predict. It depends partly on the amount of moisture in the grow kit, but also on the moisture in the environment and the temperature of the room. Some people, like us, get lucky and get a whole bunch. While others are blessed with one big fungus or just several small ones. Whether a second harvest will succeed is not certain. But definitely worth a try. All you have to do is rehydrate the mush a little and tape the holes again. If necessary, you can carefully scoop out some coffee grounds and put fresh ones on top. This way, we managed to get a second and even third harvest. Is your bucket no longer working? Then you can buy new spawn and start all over again (sterilise bucket). By the way, you can also grow oyster mushrooms in your own bucket: how that works, see here.
Sustainable gift
A Fryslân Fungies Oyster Mushroom Growkit costs 15 euros (excluding 3.95 euros shipping costs). My husband got the grow kit as a gift from St Nicholas. He really liked it, both to get and to do together. In short, a fun and sustainable gift idea. Enthusiastic? Use the discount code GREENLIST10 to get 10% discount on your growkit.
More DIY tips from thegreenlist.nl
- We got down to business with the help of Pineut with a homemade recipe banana bread from old bananas.
- Also sustainable and fun to follow: some vegetables can grow back on their own.
- Beauty products you can also make yourself. Did you know? Check out the recipe to self deo and own lip balm to make!
Photo credits: thegreenlist.nl.
