Putting the fun back in fungi!
Are you in the dark when it comes to mushrooms? Farmer Ian Garrone, who grows 70 varieties, is happy to tell you all about them.
While they may seem like one big science experiment gone awry to some of us, folks in San Francisco just can’t get enough of mushrooms. And at the Far West Fungi store in the Ferry Plaza Building, the lines are long and questions are endless for owner Ian Garrone. But he wouldn’t have it any other way because, as he’s found out over the years, there really is no better venue for educating people about the mysterious mushrooms—even people who at first glance don’t think they have an affinity for them.
“I do get a lot of, ‘I don’t like mushrooms,’” said Ian. “They say things like, ‘When I was a kid, my mom would feed me those mushrooms in a can.’ And with that, you’re talking about one variety of mushroom and we have 70 varieties of mushrooms here.”
At the small but packed store, it seems like they have a mushroom to please everyone, along with every mushroom product, book or T-shirt you could imagine. All of the mushrooms come from Ian’s family farm, which he runs with his dad, John, and his step-mom, Toby. Located in Moss Landing in Monterey County, the greenhouses where the mushrooms are grown span more than 60,000 square feet. The family grows everything from oysters to shiitakes to king trumpets to even something called a bear’s head.
It all starts with “bricks,” which are made from a blend of sawdust and rice bran that are filled into plastic bags. The bags are then carted into a high-pressure steam treatment and then taken into a filtered air room where workers treat the bags with care as they introduce them to fungi spawn. After a primary growing period of four to 12 weeks, they are taken to their private rooms to grow for another couple of weeks, depending on the variety. Then they are harvested. After that, the mushrooms are sorted by size and quickly refrigerated to maintain freshness and quality—both traits the farm has become known for over the years.
The family says they are always looking to introduce new fans to their favorite fungi. And with loyal customers willing to cook up the mushrooms into a variety of mouthwatering dishes, everyone here is ready to be, yes, you guessed it … stuffed to the gills with fungi success!
For more information about Far West Fungi, visit www.farwestfungi.com.
