Gourmet wood-lovers
Maitake, hen of the woods
Grifola frondosa
Never eat a wild-foraged mushroom you identified from a website, this one included. Wild mushroom misidentification can be fatal, and no page can rule a specimen IN. This reference is about cultivated and shop-bought mushrooms only: species you buy, or grow from bought spawn, where there is nothing to identify. To identify anything wild, consult a qualified local expert holding the actual specimen, never a description on a screen.
Also sold as
- Hen of the woods
- Ram's head
- Sheep's head
- Dancing mushroom
In the kitchen
Flavour
Rich, earthy and peppery, holding its own against strong seasoning.
Texture
Feathered, layered fronds that crisp beautifully at the edges while staying tender inside.
In the kitchen
Tear into clusters and roast or sear hard so the frond edges crisp. It stands up to roasting whole and to bold sauces.
How it is cultivated
Substrate
Sterilised supplemented hardwood sawdust, or oak logs buried partly in soil. It is slower and fussier than the oysters or lion's mane.
Fruiting temperature
13-18°C (55-64°F)
Humidity
85-95% relative humidity
How it is grown
Supplemented sawdust, or buried inoculated hardwood logs
Time to first harvest
Roughly 60 to 90 days on a block; a season or more on buried logs
How much, how long
One large clustered fruit per block
Difficulty at home
Advanced. Long colonisation and a preference for cool fruiting make it one of the harder gourmets to grow at home.
What is worth knowing about it
Prized in both the kitchen and the supplement trade. It grows at the base of oaks in the wild, and buried-log culture imitates that; the sawdust-block route is faster but needs clean technique and patience.
Elsewhere on the site
Sources
- Wikipedia, Grifola frondosa
- Stamets, Growing Gourmet and Medicinal Mushrooms
Others in this group