Our Brown Oyster – (Pleurotus ostreatus) strain is one of the best tasting in our collection. Very similar to the native white oyster, this strain differs in that it has a softer, inflated stem that is edible! The entire mushroom can be sliced and cooked, making it a great value for consumers. This strain can grow to almost a foot across and the cap margin becomes a beautiful, wavy shape when mature.
The Brown oyster is light sensitive, so it does not like growing in clear containers or bags, opt for black bags or use nursery pots, buckets or bins with holes in them. This strain becomes trapped in clear containers and they cannot find the holes to escape! Not as sweet as the blue or elm oyster, this one is the best meat substitute we have, and can be oiled and grilled whole for oyster sandwiches or cubed up and threaded onto kabobs.
Outdoors it fruits well on oak, sweetgum, poplar, and many other hardwood species in the spring and fall. Indoors we recommend fruiting this strain on pasteurized wheat straw and cotton hulls for incredible yields. We grow this strain year-round indoors and it forms beautiful, thick clusters, and is the most CO2 tolerant of all of our oyster strains. We are able to produce this mushroom indoors year-round due to its wide temperature fruiting window.
Check out our blog post on How to Cultivate Oyster Mushrooms with Recipe!
| Edibility and Taste | Meaty and Earthy |
| Grows On | Hardwood Logs and Stumps (Outdoors):alder, ash, aspen, beech, birch, elm, maple, oak, sweetgum, box elder, cottonwood, willow, ailanthus, tulip poplar. Pasteurized Straw or Agricultural Byproduct (Indoors) |
| Fruiting Temps | 50-75F |
| Availability | Year-Round |