Growing a Mushroom Farm with Max Goransson of Golden Mushroom Co
Alisa Nappa
Today we sit down with Max Goransson of Golden Mushroom Co. from Ocean Beach San Diego sunny California to chat mushroom farming, surfing, creating a mushroom community, encountering bears and gorillas, philosophy and more.
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TRANSCRIPT
Unknown Speaker 0:11
What is going on? Welcome, welcome. This is the mushroom revival podcast and I'm your host, Alex Dora. And we are absolutely obsessed with a wonderful, wacky mysterious world of mushrooms and fungi. We bring on guests and experts from all around the planet to geek out with us and go down this mysterious rabbit hole of all things. fungi and mushrooms. And today we have Max from from Golden Mushroom Co. Where are you? Where are you calling in from California San Diego. A There you go. Okay, man. Doing great. Thanks for having me. Cool. So for people who don't know Golden Mushroom CO and yourself, what are you up to in San Diego? Oh, man, we're growing fresh mushrooms for local farmers markets. That's where we started and where we still are. We've moved into other products from crow kits, prints other things. But yeah, still plugging away on markets production.
Unknown Speaker 1:14
So on. Sweet Yeah, I got introduced to you via the IG and seeing these pictures of all these beautiful humans holding stacks of blocks with just crazy flushes of mushrooms.
Unknown Speaker 1:28
They look awesome. The the mushrooms are happy. Hi. And how did you originally get into mushrooms?
Unknown Speaker 1:37
About like 12 years ago, I think I was 17 or 18 years old.
Unknown Speaker 1:42
I had an interesting mushroom experience where I went back to my buddy's house. We're living together at the time. And I was like, man, like you got to try this and he was smart, but a straight edge type, you know?
Unknown Speaker 1:57
So he was like, No way man. He's like not unless we groom ourselves. So I'm just like, on the computer immediately picking up kids and yeah, I'm gonna figure it out. Right. So within like, I think a week or two we had a bunch of tubs and pre sterilized jars. You know how the old school kits go then at least like a decade plus ago.
Unknown Speaker 2:19
And we got everything in and didn't have an outstanding grow. But it was enough to just completely take over. From there. I mean, both of us. became pretty like obsessive. Really like the lab side tissue cultures different. Yes. Was it like brown brown rice flour cakes on perlite. Like in a bin? Yes, sir. Yeah, yeah. Cool off cakes. Yeah. Did they make it work? You know, oh, my God, dude, that was like, and you barely get any yields from that. And like, it's so complicated. Now. It's like, you buy an all in one bag online, and you just jab it with a syringe and you have like, eight pounds like that. You'd barely make it too easy now to grow. It's, yeah, that's the one thing whenever you see the direction of mushrooms, you're like, how are they going to be able to just like, cut people off and narrow them in on a product. It's like you could just do this at home.
Unknown Speaker 3:18
Right? Right. Do you have a fit? Because you guys grow a bunch of different gourmet species. Now. Do you have a favorite one?
Unknown Speaker 3:28
I have to just go with the whole umbrella of oysters because there's so many different kinds. And I'll be the basic one, but it's the one we started with. And I'm still like looking at people's different hybrids or things that come out and we're getting in like different liquid cultures and trying them there's so many different temperatures types is the most interesting to go through oysters as basic as they are for mushroom growers is the easiest one for people to grow for people that are listening that aren't into mushrooms, so
Unknown Speaker 4:04
and they'll they're really funny because I've grown them off weird stuff. Like I've grown them off cigarette butts and people I know have grown them off like jeans and like you've done you've done some experiments off random. Yeah, no, and they grow on everything. I mean, oysters just they want to grow. They're very voracious other mushrooms are a little little pickier, you know, and our little drama queens but that oysters don't they don't care. They're they're there to grow. They have one purpose. And Izzy is really funny. Back in the day when I was working at this local mushroom farm in Massachusetts. They did better when we threw them outside than they did in our room. They they're just like rebels in that way where they they're almost like challenge me like give me the worst conditions possible. And I'll prove to you that I can just flourish. So out of all the oysters you have a
Unknown Speaker 5:00
My favorite
Unknown Speaker 5:03
taste wise I would, and texture wise, I would say Italian oysters.
Unknown Speaker 5:09
Pink oysters, because they bring people up to the stand and start a conversation. Because people are like, I would have never expected that, you know, the amount of questions that we get off that. So, you know, if I'm cooking, I'd say Italian oysters, and then I just have to thank pink oysters for bringing people in. Yeah, yeah, we, we, I used to do at farmer's markets for a couple of years. And we literally only had yellow and pink oysters just to bring people to the table. Right? And it was like a shelf by us. Yeah, shelf. Likewise, pink oyster did not make sense. You got like 48 hours, you know, going back to the thing, whenever you said they would perform better outside. There's a really large mushroom company that's across the nation now. But they recently set up in Southern California. And I have some friends that are mushroom growers north to here. And they would only flush once, right? And they would ship a lot of their colonized blocks over they would only flush once, and then they had nowhere for their waste. So this other mushroom farmer is taking all their waste of their blocks. And I was talking to them on the phone. They're like, we just piling them all out. Man is loads of flushes. They're doing better than our oysters indoors. Yeah. So they started setting them up in a more like
Unknown Speaker 6:26
formal setting. And they're just pulling mass flushes off of them at a time. And they come to them at no cost. If they can track them. I can tell you, right, yeah, I tell anyone that's wanting to get into growing mushrooms just take the second blocks from already existing mushroom farms. And now it's cool. There's back in the day, there wasn't too many. But now they're all over the place, which is great. And people can just pick up those second blocks and just even just chuck them in their garden and they'll they'll go they'll go Yeah, It's wild. Yeah. What would you say, is the craziest mushroom story that you have? And it could be psychedelic. It could be just, you know, starting this mushroom farm. And, you know, it can be pretty much anything you can think of? Yeah, I got a good one from, from younger years, for sure.
Unknown Speaker 7:15
So my buddy, and I think I'm trying to think about how old I was. I was probably like
Unknown Speaker 7:21
19 or 20 years old, and the same guy that I had grown those tubs with, right? So we started experimenting with different strains. And we had a standard of what we thought was good for us for an evening. And we took that same standard with something new. So long and behold, it was a little bit farther than what you would think. Right?
Unknown Speaker 7:43
So we were like, living on a mountainside in Maryland at the time was really beautiful outdoors. Nobody around and
Unknown Speaker 7:52
we're like, let's start a bonfire outside of that for sure. So I go inside, I go to use the bathroom, and I'm on my way out. And I take a look at the shower curtain. And I'm like, Man, this is a lot faster than you would think. You know, it's only been 15 or 20 minutes or something. So I'm like, Okay, we're in for a step back out to the bonfire. And like, Hey, Mike, I come out and he's like, long stare at the fire. And he's like, we gotta go inside. I'm like, well just started the fire man, you know, you don't need to go inside. He's like, No, we need to go inside. I saw something out in the woods. I'm like, just kind of want to accommodate to him. And I was like, if he's feeling this way, for sure, we should go inside. So I'm like, let's put the fire out. So
Unknown Speaker 8:34
I'm sure as you well know, whenever there's a big change, there's a big change of emotions, right? So we dump water on the fire, put it out and it's pitch black.
Unknown Speaker 8:44
We have to walk back over to the house. So we know the path, you know, we're walking back up to the house. And it's beautiful stars outside. And we're about to go into like, indoor lighting. And he sees it and he's like, Well, this isn't it.
Unknown Speaker 8:57
You know? So I'm like, well, we can sit down look at the stars or something, you know, and so we lay out on the deck. And then we're looking up at the stars and having a grand old time no lights. And
Unknown Speaker 9:10
yeah, so the security lights go on in front of the house and kind of illuminate the house because we're on the backside of the home. And they had a couple of cats and the cats come ripping around the back of the house. And my buddy's like, what's that what's going on? And I'm like, you know, just could be like an animal or something, nothing to worry about like that. And he's like, did you hear a car come up the driveway? I'm like, No, so we're starting to get the mild hysteria.
Unknown Speaker 9:35
I'm looking up and he keeps laying down looking at the stars like okay, if I can't see anything, nothing's a problem. So I sit up and look and the illumination of the house, I see a huge silhouette come around the side of the house. And I'm looking at it and I'm for sure looking at this regardless of where I'm at mine state wise, and I'm like, Hey, Mike, look at this. You got to look at this and try to explain it to him. And it's moving around the side of the house. And he's like
Unknown Speaker 10:00
Nah, man, nah, stop fucking with me. Stop fucking with me. No. And I'm like, No, I'm about to get up. And so I like make a quick dash across the deck is it's moving closer and slam the security light on full grown bear
Unknown Speaker 10:15
this damn
Unknown Speaker 10:18
base to terrorists after he's just on the other side of the patio, and I'm not looking at him and he's looking at me and then Mike gets up and I see him just freeze. And the bear like looks at us and he's like, nope, and just takes off running mate comes into the house, we kind of break the patio door coming into the house. And I think the next out we're holding each other like, we're gonna be good.
Unknown Speaker 10:42
emotional guy.
Unknown Speaker 10:46
That was probably the last thing I expected. Yeah, we always talked about it all the time. I'm gonna, I'm gonna see him later this weekend, even though he's on the East Coast, because he now runs a mushroom company as well. So we grew into this community together. And it's like, a hard conversation to avoid whenever we're together. It's like we retell it all.
Unknown Speaker 11:08
So, I'm sure and I talked to pretty much everyone who's had
Unknown Speaker 11:15
had or have a mushroom company. It's it's a lot of hard work, especially running a mushroom farm.
Unknown Speaker 11:22
You know, it's not an easy thing to do. So what has been your journey from day one? You know, has it been?
Unknown Speaker 11:31
Easy, crazy? All of the above? You know, Where where are you at currently with, with the business? Where do you want to go? What's been your journey like?
Unknown Speaker 11:41
In the beginning, it was, it just naturally happened in the sense of like,
Unknown Speaker 11:48
losing the job during COVID. Getting into mushrooms.
Unknown Speaker 11:54
Were getting back into mushrooms from growing a long time ago, and just hobby growing again, that spread the like food for the home into providing food for the neighbors into Hey, we should start at our local farmers market, and so on. So we're growing out of the garage for the last two years completely converted the garage into a grow room only focused on fresh mushrooms. Year two, we started putting smaller shaped colonised blocks into like cardboard Uline boxes and just piecing those out of the market. Because the best part about us growing was the fact there was an entire process. And that wasn't really shared with the end consumer. Granted, everybody's getting fresh mushrooms locally. And it was going great. We're meeting a lot of people, I wanted to share the experience that I have with other people. So the grow kit was the way to do that. And then people were just stumped, coming back to the market. Like I got this match, bah, bah, bah like. And then we started teaching people how to grow their own rocks and not need to grow kits and whatnot. And that was even more exciting. I just love doing that just to nerd out with people. So nowadays, we've now box to grow kit and we're going to be pushing those out to retail stores as well as online and E commerce and I really want to go into getting growth kits in people's hands. But then I want to start figuring out how to teach people how to not need a company for a cat. So like, Sure, get the sale. But find some type of education way that comes along with the set the sale itself. So linking people into YouTube or something, I just want to find some type of way because there's going to be a percentage of people that are gonna want to learn how to grow rising tide brings all boats.
Unknown Speaker 13:42
But to answer the question about
Unknown Speaker 13:45
it being tough along the way or, or good or not, I mean, definitely not always easy.
Unknown Speaker 13:52
Contamination whenever you try to level up in mushroom growing as people that grow they're listening to this Well, no.
Unknown Speaker 13:59
Everybody is like, Okay, this is all running perfect. So instead of this 10 Let's do 100 And right whenever you go into 100 you never realize the amount of variables that can change. Have you ever heard of TRICARE? DERMA before?
Unknown Speaker 14:19
It's just super rare thing. I don't know. It's very, you know, podcast
Unknown Speaker 14:28
Yeah, I go to sleep thinking about contamination buddy. happens because you want to target where it's at. Right? And
Unknown Speaker 14:36
trying to find the variables of contamination and where it's at will just keep you up at night. So yeah, yeah. What What would you say, you know, what would you say are your biggest strong suits in running this business running this farm? And then where would you say are your biggest weaknesses or areas that are not your strengths? You know, it's really funny. Interview
Unknown Speaker 15:00
All these different people that have mushroom companies and some people come in and they're like, I know marketing, I know sales, but I won't like you put me in a lab and I will I have no idea what's going on other people are like, put me in front of a flow hood. And I don't care about anything else. Other people are like, I'm coming from an engineering background, let me r&d, some crazy, you know, equipment that can make this whole process better. What would you say are your biggest like, I crushed that area? You know, man, biggest strength would be
Unknown Speaker 15:37
more leadership roles, organization of teams. So now that we're in a space, and we have like a production team, I think like leaving the team, not pay setting people and saying we need this by this time, but better just coming in coaching and then leaving it to somebody to either mess up or do it right. And then from there moving along, I think my like leadership skills and just being around the team and spending time with them versus like, just kind of like type A and I need this done now style. I think that that's gotten me the farthest and it's made the best, like strength that I have. And best team honestly didn't expect it out of myself until it was moving along. So on top of that,
Unknown Speaker 16:22
content, editing videos, I grew up like thinking I was going to be like some special effects video editor. Sweet.
Unknown Speaker 16:30
Yeah, as a kid, so that was like, that's my favorite thing to do is that I love putting together video and bringing people in
Unknown Speaker 16:38
probably talking meeting people of markets making new connections.
Unknown Speaker 16:45
Yeah, I think weaknesses would be paperwork. Definitely paperwork, taxes, all that fun stuff, amount of business, all this stuff. Instagram doesn't
Unknown Speaker 17:00
accounting. I love learning new programs, though. So to learn to really like push through Google Sheets and QuickBooks all the boring stuff.
Unknown Speaker 17:11
As much as it's a weakness, that it's really cool to learn a new skill and have that for life.
Unknown Speaker 17:17
I think electrical work.
Unknown Speaker 17:20
Yeah. Last week, I had my like, hands on, like 100 amp panel, and I'm like, please, Like
Unknown Speaker 17:30
obviously, turn the breaker off, but it's just like, electrically not super inclined. And in mushroom growing. Those, you know, sterilizers autoclaves, big boy equipment that you need to make sure is running smoothly and safely. Yeah, yeah. No, it's really funny. When running any business, but especially mushroom farm, or any mushroom company. It's like, you think you're going in to specialize in mushrooms and then you're doing special of effects? For video, you're doing accounting you're doing
Unknown Speaker 18:01
you have to be a master of all trades. And it Yeah, it's it's an incredible learning experience of how interconnected everything is. And if and learning how to delegate because you can't do everything, right. And then just forming a good community around you have people that are good with electrical stuff are good with organizing the paperwork, paperwork and accounting and all this stuff that you don't want to do. And then you can you can focus on what you do.
Unknown Speaker 18:31
When it's hard is easier said than done to delegate and be a good leader and you know, have good people around you. I hear for most, most people that I've interviewed the people aspect is the hardest, hardest part usually, but what besides contamination what what keeps you up at night?
Unknown Speaker 18:53
Probably exciting stuff. Like if, if we talk to somebody and they're like, Oh, absolutely, we would love to like stock your product or something, then my mind is just like going okay, like, how would we get it to stores how we do this, like any, like achievement
Unknown Speaker 19:10
type.
Unknown Speaker 19:12
It keeps me up. I'll be honest, sleeping in my car, it's time to turn the brain off. And it's really hard for me to do that. Because I want things to like run smoothly. Like I'll be really excited about something but then like, how do we how do we do it the way it should be done?
Unknown Speaker 19:25
Yeah, it's hard for me to turn the brain off sometimes with those things. What What has been your biggest accomplishment?
Unknown Speaker 19:34
Probably bringing in friends and family into the business. Nice people that I've just known for a long time. I guess some people say they'll hire friends. Probably the best thing I ever did.
Unknown Speaker 19:48
So far. Sure. I think other people
Unknown Speaker 19:52
would say that for specific reasons. But I've brought a lot of my friends into the business that knew nothing about mushrooms and they're so into it now.
Unknown Speaker 20:00
Some people just want things to go the right way. And my sister has been working at a school for a long time. She's pretty tired of it. And next month, she's gonna start with golden and start working for us, and I'm gonna work with my sister.
Unknown Speaker 20:18
I think that's amazing. That's an accomplishment for me. Yeah, I mean, as, as long as you're good with with boundaries, and learning to compartmentalize those emotions and things like that, I think it can work. But yeah, it's, it's a tight rope for sure. And I've done it I've worked with, with my friends, my family, and even my significant other, and it's like, there are definitely power dynamics in play. And there are, you know, with money and
Unknown Speaker 20:54
and just like,
Unknown Speaker 20:56
yeah, if things go south in the business, like, does that affect your friendship or, you know, certain things that you expect?
Unknown Speaker 21:07
Yeah, it can be really difficult to navigate, or it can be awesome. And you're just like hanging out with your friends and family all day.
Unknown Speaker 21:17
And you're working on a combined dream. But at the end of the day, it's really your dream. And so some people can manage it really well. And then other times, it can be hard, but I you seem like a cool, cool, dude. So I don't I don't necessarily get the vibe that you're abusing your position of power by any means. So yeah, definitely not. It hasn't been a cakewalk either. Those definitely still really tough times, especially working with with friends, but
Unknown Speaker 21:47
just mostly having the funds to have a team and then have it be the friends that are getting paid from. From me just growing mushrooms in a tub 10 years ago. Yeah. So I kind of look at that as the accomplishment definitely wasn't saying that there isn't really tough times where you're like, This is my close friend. So you obviously know each other that well, and you speak to each other that closely, so it'd be easy for somebody to cross the line. Yeah, in certain situations, especially whenever there's tension in production or work or contamination attracted Derman. Yeah, yeah. But it's still, it's definitely
Unknown Speaker 22:26
feels better than the worst slides. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, no, the one of the best pieces of advice I got for for hiring is,
Unknown Speaker 22:36
it's something I'm gonna butcher the exact quote, but it's something like, hire for the person, not the skill, because you can train the skill, but you can't train the person. And by person, I mean, like their ethics, their personality, their humanity. There's been plenty of times where I've had people that are really skillfully good, but they're not the most fun to be around, right. And I'm like, you're getting the job done. But you kind of suck to be,
Unknown Speaker 23:11
you know, and like, I can't train you to be a good person. And like, sometimes ethically, like, I don't align with you, and not I can't train, right. But if someone's just a great a person, I can train you in the skill, you know, I can teach you lab skills all day, and you're a good person. And that's all that matters. So that's been huge for me. And so I get, you know, it if you're already good friends with that person, that sorry, that checkmark is already checked, you know? Yeah. So the, the thing about going back to the friend thing, again, is that they have, I guess the team that we have that are closer to me, because they've known me for a long time. They want to see everything succeed and push along versus just get a paycheck. They want the paycheck, but they really want to see success in the business, they want to see us push along they want to figure out the whys if there's contamination and learn along the way. And there are some people that we have hired that
Unknown Speaker 24:10
don't care as much or will share slack on the job or be on their phone a lot or be the if there's a job that only requires four people at the time and there's a loose end they always happen to be the loose end or the person that's not doing anything where my friends are the closer people to me I'll come and just be like, Hey, how's this fare? You know, it says you know, we're getting paid the same along the way and this person just gets to do what they want all the time. So there's been things like that, that are that are tough to where you have to come in and delegate sit down either with everybody or one on one and and figure it out. But what a learning experience to be able to be in the position to do that. I think my communication skills have
Unknown Speaker 24:49
gone way up since starting this.
Unknown Speaker 24:54
For for, you know, for people that want to get into starting a mushroom farm
Unknown Speaker 25:00
They want to get into mushrooms to help pay their bills and, and take it seriously. From what was it been four years? 334 years? So going into year three, so like go to three. And yeah, so two years here, knowing all that, you know, now, if you could take, you know, all your funds, all everything and start over from scratch,
Unknown Speaker 25:23
what would you do differently if, if anything?
Unknown Speaker 25:27
I think, obviously, it'd be like knowledge. So along the way, we're plugging away doing things a certain way and having an issue. I'll be in production wherever and then looking back learning something new and being like, that's why that was always going wrong. Yeah, that could be through sterilization, pH of substrate or different things that I just was doing things basic kind of throwing shit at the wall, as you say, you know, and then later looking at it and being like, Oh, wow, that's why this was happening half the time. So probably just going back and being like, do this. Let me do this.
Unknown Speaker 26:04
And there were there were answers whenever I would plug away for weeks trying to find them. So probably go back and give myself all the answers. But you can't do that.
Unknown Speaker 26:14
I think if we had unlimited funds, and different things,
Unknown Speaker 26:20
I would dive more into exciting things nonprofit stuff micro remediation, being out in the field, you know, if you're a mushroom grower, on a farm, I've always wanted a farm life or a farm style job, which I did sure get to go into that. But I'm indoors 40 hours a week we're thinking labs, indoor fruiting rooms, everything like the guys come outside. They're like two o'clock for lunch. And we're just like, squinting eyes looking at the sun be like, Wow, it's beautiful outside wouldn't have known
Unknown Speaker 26:50
as like, as much as it is a farm. I would like to be outside doing more nature stuff with unlimited resources and go out and Rockefeller on him and DNA sequence and being locked. Yeah. Yeah. So that sometimes I look and I envy some like unlimited funds. I'd be out in the field and totally good. Yeah. Yeah. It's funny. I had an employee. One of my he's great. His name was Graham's Krupa. And he was just like, such a kick ass human. And
Unknown Speaker 27:21
he came in one day, and he was like, all bummed. And I think it was
Unknown Speaker 27:26
it was springtime, and, you know, the, it's getting warmer and whatever. And he was so sad. And he, you know, came to me, he's like, look, it's about summertime. And he's like, yeah, he had a long history with farming outside, you know, and he was like, Look,
Unknown Speaker 27:44
I think I've hit my limit of fluorescent lights indoors. And he's like, I'm a farmer, I love this stuff. But I, I, my soul needs to be outside. And I like, couldn't, I was like, Dude, get outside man. Like, I was like, because I'm his friend. I'm like, get outside, like, I'm not even sad that you're leaving. I'm more excited that you know what your body needs and get out there. You know, I have full understanding. And I totally get that. And, you know, both of us are going to two different mushroom farm. Two different mushroom festivals this weekend. And I'm like, so excited to go foraging. And it's, it's one of my highlights is just getting outside with friends and picking wild mushrooms. You know, so absolutely huge.
Unknown Speaker 28:33
Is there an area of mycology that you
Unknown Speaker 28:39
would like to know more about that you? You don't? And if you have questions, for as much, yeah, so everything outside, you know, like Mike rice or mushrooms for sure.
Unknown Speaker 28:52
I definitely can idea a lot of the basics and some outside of the basics. But if I go out with somebody that's like full time foraging, I'm learning all the time. And I feel like a rookie completely to mushrooms. Even though I've been obsessed for the last decade. It's been more of the Condor, fruiting cultivation. Yeah. So I would love to just learn more
Unknown Speaker 29:15
outdoors still duplicating the question the answer? Yeah. Yeah, I'll be forging with Alan Rockefeller this weekend and I'm pumped. I mean, he's, he's so fun to forage with because he's like plethora of savant like he's an alien. Like, he knows everything you know, and so humble, so nice. And just a wealth of information.
Unknown Speaker 29:38
Congrats, that's gonna be a blast. Yeah, no, it's it's super fun. And
Unknown Speaker 29:44
yeah, ya know, it that I was in this, I'm still in that boat where, you know, I'll go foraging with like namah folks or stuff like that. And they know every Latin name and I'm like, Well, if you want to go in the lab, like I'll teach you like mushroom cultivation, and it seems like they're two different worlds.
Unknown Speaker 30:00
Some people in the like the farming and then the IDX. You know, and I feel like it's coming together, people are crossing that bridge, which is exciting. And there's so many new fields and mycology that are popping up, which is awesome.
Unknown Speaker 30:14
For people that are getting into mycology, maybe getting into mushroom cultivation, any strong advice that you have for newbies getting in getting the field, definitely low and slow. Work your way up to where you're at. started as a hobby. If you can't, I mean, unless you have a lot of prior knowledge, or you're hiring people that have a lot of knowledge.
Unknown Speaker 30:39
You should be starting as a hobby take over your garage like I did, and do it small time and just turn over stuff for the house. And the more and maybe markets the way that we did it. If I would have dove right in it would have been, they probably wouldn't have existed, you know.
Unknown Speaker 30:57
So they want to work up to that you need to find a way to shell in some money because of equipment. Because your productions limited by equipment and equipment is expensive. Especially where if you look at where we are for San Diego as well, rent is extremely expensive on top of that, but if you can't finance it yourself, you just need to find a way to do it. Because equipment will get so expensive. And if you purchase small and you're like okay, well this works right now, you'll very quickly just cap out on that small pasteurizer autoclave. Yeah, and be like, well, this is all I can do. You know, so so there's that. Another thing would be as you plug along in cultivation, if that's what you're doing, find a shelf stable product for E commerce or wholesaling. Mushrooms spoils so fast, unless you have a distributor lined up that you can just dump all your mushrooms off to and then line up your restaurants.
Unknown Speaker 31:54
You driving out and hoping that you're going to get the sales at restaurants may not happen. Or a chef, this happens all the time, we'll agree to a certain amount and then not need them regularly. And then the year just grew so much and you know that they're gone in a few days. So I'll be tinctures, gummies grow kits, all the different things, Mike, like there's so many different fields of things. You don't even have to grow them. You can just make the sterile blocks for people and do supplies and help other growers grow their business are legwork making plates. It's just like, it's a vast thing, but pick something and stick to it and maybe have a shelf stable option. Yeah. Totally. Yeah. And I think with COVID that became really clear for a lot of people that you know, it was hard to get in to markets and restaurants and I saw a lot of people switching.
Unknown Speaker 32:46
Yeah, it got it's got to stay flexible. Going back to foraging, though. Is there a certain mushroom or mushrooms plural on your bucket list that you haven't found? And you're like, oh, man, I gotta find a morel or what? I can't even say this out loud. I have never found a morel in the wild. They're hard. Yeah. fucking hard. I'm not. I'm in San Diego. So you got to think about Southern California extremely dry. I do get to travel. But whenever I'm traveling, I'm not exactly getting for a time.
Unknown Speaker 33:16
So the morale has just never happened. I was up in Colorado, and I was at a concert completely unrelated to mushrooms bumped into this guy there. And I talked to him for a second. I was like, sorry, man. He's like, Oh, no worries. And he turns around, he's like, where are you from? So I guess my part didn't fit to Colorado. And I was like, oh, Southern California. And he's like, Oh, I'm going to California in a few days. It's like cool, man. Well, for he's like, I'm afford your full time. And so I'm gonna pick and chanterelles and he started showing me all the burn Morales and things he got. I told him I hadn't picked one morale yet, and he's blown away. He's like, how long have you been growing mushrooms?
Unknown Speaker 33:55
So, morale is on the bucket list. I found. I'm in a residential area in Ocean Beach in San Diego and I found 10 pounds of chicken of the woods on a tree house last night. Yes. Yeah. So where are you? Are you cooking them up? Doing a Nashville hot fried chicken sandwich. That's gonna be for the from the Instagram. I actually grew up in Tennessee. Okay. Yeah, I was gonna say you gotta make a chicken sandwich did those videos of like professional chefs whipped in that that up? Oh, they look insane. Yeah.
Unknown Speaker 34:32
Yeah, we made a pasta last night with pesto. We got right into cook some but yeah, we're gonna try the chicken sandwich for the first time. Sweet, short story, but my first morale was actually in California, in around Lake Tahoe.
Unknown Speaker 34:48
I was doing an internship at the time. And it was like pretty late in the season, actually. And I was staying with someone that's like, Dude, you're not it. It's gone. You know like
Unknown Speaker 35:00
You're you just pass the season, you're not going to find any morels. And I was like, no, no, dude, I'm gonna find one. And he was like, Alright, just go up, like up in elevation and try to go to Cali. So every day I would drive like almost an hour across the border go around
Unknown Speaker 35:17
Lake Tahoe and and,
Unknown Speaker 35:20
you know, weeks were going by and every week that went by I was like, yeah, definitely not gonna find it. And it was like, the last day of my trip. And it was, I was already foraging for like four hours that day. And I was like, Dude, I'm not gonna find it. I'm driving back, I saw a renaissance fair. And I'm like, fuck him. Why not gonna go in there at the renaissance fair. And I didn't have any money on me. And they, they were like, you know, checking people in and there's a fee. And I saw this, like, it's a really tiny fence around the whole thing. It's, you know, those wooden fences, they're just two wooden, like, logs, you know, and so it's like, it's probably, you know, three feet high. Like, it's not much of a fence. So I just like circled around and I hopped over. And the second I land on the ground, I looked down and in between my two feet was one Morel. Just one, it was like, yes. And it was like, the sun was going down. And it's always like, and then the next year, the same thing happened. Like the second I gave up. And I was like, Ah, I'm not gonna find it this year. I looked down and right between my two feet, there's morale and they're just, they're, they're funny. I mean, mushrooms in general are funny that way. They have a weird sense of humor, especially in the psychedelic space. Which leads me to my next question for you, which is if mushrooms had the mic, and could say one thing to the whole human race, what would they say?
Unknown Speaker 36:51
This, it makes me think Have you read the book Ishmael before?
Unknown Speaker 36:57
Do you haven't read it? It's, I'm trying to think like, like layman's terms about Ishmael.
Unknown Speaker 37:04
Ishmael is a character in the book. And he he teaches a man about the beliefs of takers and levers, and like takers or being like civilized people, kind of like destructive worldviews, right, kind of where we're at right now we're trying to reverse something that we probably can't reverse. And then there's levers which are like non civilized cultures. And the book is like emphasizing takers to abandon the destructive worldview and embrace harmony with nature, which is what lever would be something that doesn't try to change something for the better. Anything else? I think if mushrooms had the mic, they would tell us to be the levers man, you know?
Unknown Speaker 37:42
Yeah. On levers. Yeah, case in point be a lever.
Unknown Speaker 37:47
It's an incredible book, you should check it out. It's super easy read. It's like real quick to the point. I think like a lot of schools just use it as a good like, example, both.
Unknown Speaker 37:57
But I think about mushrooms in that way. You know, in all the all the ways that mycelium helps underground, the entire network, everything that that we know and study today. It's just like, we're just kind of stomping on it in a way. It's the author's Daniel Quinn. Yeah, that's it. Sweet. Yeah, right now you won't be doing it. I'm doing
Unknown Speaker 38:21
something related to mushrooms. But is there a gorilla? Is it Yeah. All right. So I didn't want to dive too into it. Because it was like anybody listening to this would be like, What are you talking about? Yeah. Tell me about this gorilla. Yeah, you got to break it down. So there's a gorilla. So this guy is so odd and random, you're reading the book, you're like, Okay, this isn't making any sense. And some people could get to the point where they would put it down before it takes you away. But this guy gets an ad in the paper. And it says, teacher seeking pupil, and he's just kind of like on the road to just sitting out at the bars at night doing stuff and wakes up and he's at this point, it's like, he reads the newspaper. And he's like, what, what the fuck does that even mean? Teachers seeking pupil What are you all knowing and that you just want to teach everyone something that you know, and it's just kind of going on this person that made this ad. So he shows up to the ad just to
Unknown Speaker 39:16
you know, continue to break them and shows up and can't get into the place and walks in and there's a gorilla in a cage. And he's just blown away. Like, why is there a gorilla in this room? And the gorilla is, I suppose telepathically speaking to him about this taker libre culture. I think the author made it a gorilla to make it
Unknown Speaker 39:40
animals you know, speaking about the taker, libre culture, not another human but right and out there. But as you start to read the book and get into it, it is incredible, man. That's awesome. Cool. Yeah, I love it already. I'm my my book pile is too big.
Unknown Speaker 40:00
As for how fast I can read
Unknown Speaker 40:03
I have I have a bad habit of collecting too many books and then partly reading so many I have my bookshelf is crazy right now, but it's okay people.
Unknown Speaker 40:14
Wow Alex, you just
Unknown Speaker 40:17
so much
Unknown Speaker 40:21
yeah no it's it's a bad habit but eventually I'll get I'll get around to it. I'm getting more into reading recently that it all comes into phases so this will this will be in the in the queue for sure. So what about you Where can people follow Golden Mushroom co Where are your markets? Where can people pick up the future grow kids by the time this airs your new website might be up so yeah, yeah, so we yeah, we have our flagship market is always Ocean Beach farmers market. It's right on the beach. It's a super sweet spot. Alex, come visit, please.
Unknown Speaker 41:00
Let's go, sir. Yeah, absolutely. And then, so Greg gets all of our products, you can find it that market and then we'll bounce into other markets in the area. And we always post about where we're at. As far as the socials go, it's really easy Instagram, Facebook, tick tock, all the things are just cold in mushroom cup, straight up and then for the website called a mushroom co.com. And then we're gonna release the kids halfway through November, we're going to be stocking retail stores. We're just like waiting to announce where but it's gonna be really exciting. I'm really excited to just have a place where people can always go get a kit, not just Wednesday night at the market. So having those stores in place will be great. And if you're a gorilla, you know this is for you. And if you're a bear you know it's turned turn the other way is now
Unknown Speaker 41:51
is that correctly?
Unknown Speaker 41:53
Moral of this whole podcast Yeah, backhoe Well, it's been a pleasure. I hope you have a sweet time in Oklahoma this weekend. Definitely tell me how that how that goes. I wish I could be in two different places but
Unknown Speaker 42:09
one one mushroom Fest at a time. And yeah, man. Yeah, it's been it's been real and thank you everyone for tuning in and tuning in to another episode of the mushroom revival podcast. We could not do it without you. Otherwise, I would just be speaking to into an empty space so appreciate your ears and your brain processing all these cool mushroom guests that we're bringing on from all over the world and we don't have a Patreon or any way that you can directly support but if you liked the show, definitely leave a review that goes a long way. Tell your friends and family spread the word. Keep the mycelial threads pump in and grow in we want more people getting into mushrooms and getting out in the woods connecting back to nature. And another way you can support we have a website mushroom revival.com We have organic mushroom gummies and powders tinctures capsules to support your health and well being and if you want to try them out we have a surprise coupon code just is VIP just for listeners of this podcast. The code is pod treat. For a surprise discount you got to you got to plug it in to figure out how much you're going to save. We change it all the time.
Unknown Speaker 43:25
We also have a bunch of free ebooks on there. We have my newest book, The Little Book of mushrooms that you can get off our site and we if you don't want to spend any money
Unknown Speaker 43:38
we have a giveaway going on link is in the bio if you want to win some free goodies we pick a new winner once a month, so you can win some free mushroom revival goodies. And that's about it. You know keep keep keep the mushroom spirit alive and as always much love and may the spores be with you
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
