Medicinal

The main medicinal mushrooms

Most mushrooms in this category are wood-decaying species (polypores) that grow very slowly and accumulate unique biologically active substances in their fruiting bodies (beta-glucans, triterpenes, specific antioxidants).

1. Chaga / Birch conk (Inonotus obliquus): This mushroom looks like an ugly, black, cracked growth on the trunk of a living birch. Its inside is rusty brown. Nobody makes soup from it. Chaga is gathered, dried, ground to a powder and brewed like a dark tea. It's known for its antioxidant properties and is used in supportive therapy for gastrointestinal diseases.

2. Reishi / Lacquered bracket (Ganoderma lucidum): The "mushroom of immortality" in Chinese medicine. It has a beautiful cap that looks coated in red lacquer. It's dried and used to make alcohol or water extracts. It's being studied as a powerful immunostimulant.

3. Turkey tail (Trametes versicolor): A beautiful striped polypore that is very common in forests. Polysaccharide-K (PSK) is extracted from it and is officially used in Japan as a supportive drug in cancer treatment.

4. Birch polypore (Fomitopsis betulina): This mushroom was used as an antiparasitic remedy thousands of years ago (it was found in the kit of Ötzi the "Iceman," who lay in a glacier for 5000 years).

How are medicinal mushrooms prepared?

David Arora stresses that these mushrooms can't simply be eaten. Processing them is meant to draw the beneficial substances out of the mushroom's tough chitin matrix. The most common methods:

- Drying and grinding: The mushroom is cut into pieces (while it's fresh, because later it turns rock-hard), dried and ground.

- Decoctions (water extraction): Simmering the mushroom powder in water for a long time (several hours) to extract the water-soluble polysaccharides (teas).

- Tinctures (alcohol extraction): Soaking in strong alcohol to extract triterpenes and essential oils.

- Dual extraction: Combining both methods for maximum benefit (especially for reishi).