Blue Pearl Oyster Mushroom Kit

Blue Pearl Oyster is mild, nutty and slightly earthy with a meaty texture, good on a pizza, through a stir fry or raw in a salad. Raw it carries a coastal aroma with a hint of anise, and cooking turns the texture velvety. A medium to large cap with a dark basalt top. A beginner's strain, high yielding and quick to fruit, at its best between 16 and 24 degrees and tolerant from 10 to 26.

Every kit is a living block of mushroom mycelium, ready to fruit. Open it, spray it, and the first mushrooms appear in as little as two weeks. Grown on a substrate that includes soy hulls for nitrogen, potassium and trace minerals, and supplied with instructions printed on the side of the box.

Keep it indoors and out of direct sunlight, on a kitchen bench rather than a laundry or a bathroom where hot steam will reach it. Mushrooms want dim light for part of the day and darkness for the rest, the way they would under a tree canopy. Water is what drives development, so daily misting is the whole job.

Expect around 200 to 300 grams from a first crop of oysters, and two or three crops in total with good care, each smaller than the last as the block spends its energy. To harvest, reach between the cluster and the box, twist and pull to break the cluster off whole. Once the caps start curling upward, pick straight away.

Grown in Perth by The FunGuy.