Today on Mushroom Hour we have the honor of being joined by Jacob Alvarez. Jacob is an amateur mycologist focusing on dialing in cultivation methods for Fistulina hepatica, the beefsteak fungus. He started the “Beefsteak culture collection project” last year and has been collecting samples of the mushroom since early 2019. In May 2020 he made a significant breakthrough and successfully cultivated the first ever photo documented Beefsteak mushroom grow on a hardwood bag in the USA. He is based out Southern New Jersey where he owns & operates his farm Garden State Mushrooms. At the farm, he grows a wide variety of different gourmet mushrooms and continues his research figuring out better beefsteak cultivation methods. Beefsteak mushrooms are an intriguing mushroom that can be eaten raw, resemble meat in appearance and even bleed. The cultivation of the beefsteak mushroom can add some tremendous value to the mushroom market for small mushroom farms and he passionately believes the time to grow this mushroom is now! I’m excited to hear insights as to how to cultivate this mushroom and maybe be inspired to never give up on ideas even when things go very, very wrong.
TOPICS COVERED:
EPISODE RESOURCES:
Ep. 118: Galloway Wild Foods - Wild Mushrooms, Coastal Foraging & Botanical Cocktails (feat. Mark Williams)
Ep. 117: Bolt Threads & Mylo™ Unleather - Inspired by Nature, Designing for the Future (feat. David Breslauer)
Ep. 116: Just Mushrooms Cookbook - Celebrating the Future of Food (feat. Michelle Russell & Camille DeGabrielle)
Ep. 115: Feral Fungi - Alchemycology, Astromycology & Spagyric Tinctures (feat. Jason Scott)
Ep. 114: Jamaica's Mushroom Queen & Wake Network (feat. Terri Smith)
Ep. 113: Mushrooms of the Rocky Mountains and Arctic Alpine Biome (feat. Dr. Cathy Cripps)
Ep. 112: Making Music with Mushrooms - Transcription of Bioelectric Action Potentials (Michael Allen Z Prime)
Ep. 111: Mushroom Safaris in Wales & Perspectives on Anglo-Saxon Foraging (feat. Daniel Butler)
Ep. 110: Melanated Fungi - Protecting from Radioactivity & Surviving Extreme Conditions (feat. Dr. Ekaterina Dadachova)
Ep. 109: Integrated Land Enhancement & Applied Mycology (feat. Leif Olson)
Ep. 108: Mushrooms of Cascadia, Mentoring Stamets & the Promise of Psilocybe (feat. Prof. Michael Beug)
Ep. 107: Lingzhi Girl - Uniting East & West, Nature & Modernity, Death & Immortality (feat. Xiaojing Yan)
Ep. 106: Truffle Hunting, Raising a Truffle Dog & Managing Truffle Forests (feat. Melissa Waddingham)
Ep. 105: Alchemi, Amycel & Monterey Mushrooms - Mushroom Medicine, Fungal Genetics & Agaricus Farming (feat. Amir Karian)
Ep. 104: Wild Food Year - Mushrooms, Herbalism, Plant Wisdom & the Inner Universe (feat. Monica Wilde)
Ep. 103: Exploring Fungal Taxonomy, Phylogeny & the Future of Conservation (feat. Else Vellinga)
Ep. 102: The Psilocybin Mushroom Bible & The Psilocybin Chef Cookbook (feat. Dr. K Mandrake & Virginia Haze)
Ep. 101: Queendom Fungi - Mycology as a Queer Discipline (feat. Dr. Patricia Kaishian)
Ep. 100: Mycoworks - Mycelium Leather, Reishi & the Future of Fashion (feat. Phil Ross)
Ep. 99: Fungi for the People - Understanding Bioremediation & Engaging Fungal Allies (feat. Ja Schindler)
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