How Mushrooms Could Help New York State Thrive.

It may be time to say goodbye to the Big Apple and embrace the Big Mushroom instead, as specialty mushroom farms continue to pop up in New York State is an unassuming forest green building on the banks of the Hudson River in Troy, New York, nestled between a used car lot and a towing company. This renovated auto repair shop fits right next to commercial buildings. 

There are no open fields or garden beds overflowing with crops. But step inside, and everything will change. You’ve discovered Collared City Mushrooms.
Colorful paintings by local artists hang on the walls. There are reference books like Medicinal Mushrooms: The Essential Guide and recipes for dishes like Smoked Spanish Oyster Mushrooms. A stuffed elf sits on the windowsill.

In the refrigerator, shoppers will find Collar City’s harvest: a special mushroom produced in three air-conditioned growing areas.
Each chamber has vertical racks covered with brown substrate blocks that provide the nutrients and energy needed for mushroom growth and fruiting. Totaling only 320 square feet, the growing areas produce approximately 150 pounds of mushrooms per week. Half a dozen different mushrooms are in production at any given time.

“We have mountains of mushrooms right now,” Collar City owner Avery Stempel tells a customer looking at oysters, shiitakes, dandelions, and king trumpets. “Do you want me to make the mixture?” Stempel and his partner Amy Hood founded the company in 2020.
Collar City is based on the idea that to know mushrooms is to love them. However, most Americans need a better introduction to the variety of edible mushroom species, many of which can be found in their own backyards. For example, Stempel and Hood developed a love for mushrooms while foraging.

“I went into the forest and found this patch of color, a mysterious mushroom that suddenly appeared and always fascinated me,” says Stempel. “When Amy and I met, the only thing we had in common was that our phones were full of pictures of mushrooms.” After getting to know each other for a while, they started talking about setting up a mushroom farm.

It was mostly just a dream—until Stempel was fired from the performing arts centre at the start of the pandemic. “I thought maybe this was the catalyst I needed to start a mushroom farm,” he says.

Collar City now sells mushrooms to about 20 restaurants and plans to double its business to 300 pounds a week in 2023 from 150 pounds. Other goals include building a grow room in the basement, a bar and stage for performances, and a commercial kitchen.

When the company was created, Stempel and Hood were ahead of the curve. The New York Times declared the mushroom the ingredient of the year 2022, noting that “small urban mushroom farms should thrive.” The buzz has been justified, but the majority of mushrooms consumed in the United States still come from one commercially produced species: Agaricus bisporus. These mushrooms come in several shapes familiar to the pizza or salad eater: pin, brown, and portobello.

Specialty mushrooms, defined as mushrooms outside the Agaricus genus, are a small but emerging niche that Stempel and others hope to cultivate and bring into the mainstream.
Steve Gabriel, a mushroom and agroforestry specialist at Cornell’s Small Farms Program in central New York, began teaching outdoor growers how to grow shiitake mushrooms about a decade ago. Interest exploded, and Cornell began working with indoor growers about two years ago to meet grower demand. “People kept asking about it,” says Gabriel.
“People are very quick about specialty mushrooms,” says Devon Gilroy, owner of Tivoli Mushrooms in the small town of Hudson, about 50 miles south of Troy. “The problem is that the mushrooms you see in the grocery store die in plastic bags.”

Founded six years ago in a former chair factory on the banks of the Hudson River, Tivoli Mushrooms is in the midst of a major expansion. Currently, the farm produces approximately 1,000 kilogrammes of mushrooms per week. The larger building will allow Tivoli to dramatically increase production to 12,000–15,000 kilogrammes per week. “No one in New York State takes as many specialty mushrooms as we do,” says Gilroy, who sells to restaurants, markets, and pharmacies.

Gilroy also wants to tap the growing market for “functional mushrooms,” which have benefits such as increased immunity, better brain function, and reduced inflammation and are a key ingredient in health products such as powders and teas. He recently founded a sister company, Go Mushrooms, which produces medicinal tinctures.
California and Pennsylvania are the top mushroom producers in the United States, accounting for 66 percent of the Keystone State’s total sales, according to the USDA. Still, New York growers are optimistic about the state’s potential to become a bigger player, especially in specialty markets.

These show the state’s abundance of protected forests with ideal conditions for open field cultivation with grafted logs as well as the opportunities for indoor vertical cultivation. Farmers in the eastern part of the state have a particularly good opportunity to take advantage of emerging beets in New York and the Hudson Valley.
“If you can grow mushrooms, you can sell them,” says Gabriel. “It’s not hard.” There’s a demand.

According to the US Department of Agriculture, the value of sales of commercially grown specialty mushrooms increased by 32 percent to $87.3 million in 2021-2022. That increase came even as the value of the agaricus crop, estimated at $931 million, was down 7% from the previous season.
Gabriel estimates that there are at least 500 specialty mushroom growers in the United States, including about 100 in New York, but many find it difficult to engage full-time. It’s also hard to get an accurate picture of how many people are growing.

It may be time to say goodbye to the Big Apple and embrace the Big Mushroom instead, as specialty mushroom farms continue to pop up in New York State.
is an unassuming forest green building on the banks of the Hudson River in Troy, New York, nestled between a used car lot and a towing company. This renovated auto repair shop fits right next to commercial buildings. There are no open fields or garden beds overflowing with crops. But step inside, and everything will change. You’ve discovered Collared City Mushrooms.
Colorful paintings by local artists hang on the walls. There are reference books like Medicinal Mushrooms: The Essential Guide and recipes for dishes like Smoked Spanish Oyster Mushrooms. A stuffed elf sits on the windowsill.
In the refrigerator, shoppers will find Collar City’s harvest: a special mushroom produced in three air-conditioned growing areas.
Each chamber has vertical racks covered with brown substrate blocks that provide the nutrients and energy needed for mushroom growth and fruiting. Totaling only 320 square feet, the growing areas produce approximately 150 pounds of mushrooms per week. Half a dozen different mushrooms are in production at any given time.
“We have mountains of mushrooms right now,” Collar City owner Avery Stempel tells a customer looking at oysters, shiitakes, dandelions, and king trumpets. “Do you want me to make the mixture?” Stempel and his partner, Amy Hood, founded the company in 2020.
Collar City is based on the idea that to know mushrooms is to love them. However, most Americans need a better introduction to the variety of edible mushroom species, many of which can be found in their own backyards. For example, Stempel and Hood developed a love for mushrooms while foraging.
“I went into the forest and found this patch of color, a mysterious mushroom that suddenly appeared and always fascinated me,” says Stempel. “When Amy and I met, the only thing we had in common was that our phones were full of pictures of mushrooms.” After getting to know each other for a while, they started talking about setting up a mushroom farm.
It was mostly just a dream—until Stempel was fired from the performing arts centre at the start of the pandemic. “I thought maybe this was the catalyst I needed to start a mushroom farm,” he says.
Collar City now sells mushrooms to about 20 restaurants and plans to double its business to 300 pounds a week in 2023 from 150 pounds. Other goals include building a grow room in the basement, a bar and stage for performances, and a commercial kitchen.
When the company was created, Stempel and Hood were ahead of the curve. The New York Times declared the mushroom the ingredient of the year 2022, noting that “small urban mushroom farms should thrive.” The buzz has been justified, but the majority of mushrooms consumed in the United States still come from one commercially produced species: Agaricus bisporus. These mushrooms come in several shapes familiar to the pizza or salad eater: pin, brown, and portobello.
Specialty mushrooms, defined as mushrooms outside the Agaricus genus, are a small but emerging niche that Stempel and others hope to cultivate and bring into the mainstream.
Steve Gabriel, a mushroom and agroforestry specialist at Cornell’s Small Farms Program in central New York, began teaching outdoor growers how to grow shiitake mushrooms about a decade ago. Interest exploded, and Cornell began working with indoor growers about two years ago to meet grower demand. “People kept asking about it,” says Gabriel.
“People are very quick about specialty mushrooms,” says Devon Gilroy, owner of Tivoli Mushrooms in the small town of Hudson, about 50 miles south of Troy. “The problem is that the mushrooms you see in the grocery store die in plastic bags.”
Founded six years ago in a former chair factory on the banks of the Hudson River, Tivoli Mushrooms is in the midst of a major expansion. Currently, the farm produces approximately 1,000 kilogrammes of mushrooms per week. The larger building will allow Tivoli to dramatically increase production to 12,000–15,000 kilogrammes per week. “No one in New York State takes as many specialty mushrooms as we do,” says Gilroy, who sells to restaurants, markets, and pharmacies.
Gilroy also wants to tap the growing market for “functional mushrooms,” which have benefits such as increased immunity, better brain function, and reduced inflammation and are a key ingredient in health products such as powders and teas. He recently founded a sister company, Go Mushrooms, which produces medicinal tinctures.
California and Pennsylvania are the top mushroom producers in the United States, accounting for 66 percent of the Keystone State’s total sales, according to the USDA. Still, New York growers are optimistic about the state’s potential to become a bigger player, especially in specialty markets.
These show the state’s abundance of protected forests with ideal conditions for open field cultivation with grafted logs as well as the opportunities for indoor vertical cultivation. Farmers in the eastern part of the state have a particularly good opportunity to take advantage of emerging beets in New York and the Hudson Valley.
“If you can grow mushrooms, you can sell them,” says Gabriel. “It’s not hard.” There’s a demand.
,
According to the US Department of Agriculture, the value of sales of commercially grown specialty mushrooms increased by 32 percent to $87.3 million in 2021-2022. That increase came even as the value of the agaricus crop, estimated at $931 million, was down 7% from the previous season.
Gabriel estimates that there are at least 500 specialty mushroom growers in the United States, including about 100 in New York, but many find it difficult to engage full-time. It’s also hard to get an accurate picture of how many people are growing.

 

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