Green Options

Phallus drewesii, named after Dr. Robert Drewes of the California Academy of Sciences, is a 2 inch long phallus-shaped mushroom that grows on wood, smells like rotting meat and curves awkwardly downward.

Upon discovering that the new species would be named after him, Drewes remarked: “It is a wonderful honour and great fun to have this phallus-shaped fungus named after me. I have been immortalized in the scientific record.”

I’ve always loved the idea of foraging for food, but the idea of dying from a poisonous mushroom overdose has always put me off from plucking edibles from the ground for dinner. Luckily, you can often find a carefully selected array of wild and exotic mushrooms at grocery stores or farmers markets. Sometimes, when there’s potential for serious injury, I find it’s best to leave things up to the professionals.

I found this gorgeous array of exotic mushrooms at the Sporeboys stall at London’s beautiful Broadway Market. Mushrooms are easy to cook, good for you, and have a deliciously rich, almost meaty taste that’s a great vegetarian substitute. I made a simple sautéed mushroom mix with olive oil, herbs, and cheese that tasted great on toast as well as pasta. It could also top a number of other dishes that you’ve already got in your kitchen. It’s simple, versatile, and oh so tasty…and no fear of poison! What more could you ask for?

Here’s an easy way to cook your mushrooms and a number of ways to serve them too:

Every year more than 500,000 people die from cancer in the United States alone.

Many researchers and cancer specialists believe that up to 60% of those deaths can be prevented if Americans adopt healthier lifestyles.

According to Rachael Stolzenberg-Solomon, a researcher at the National Cancer Institute,

“The easiest and least expensive way to reduce your risk for cancer is just by eating a healthy diet.”

Here is an overview of ten important cancer fighting foods to include in your diet on a regular basis:

New research shows that mushrooms feeding on dead vegetation in soils of northern areas like Alaska and Siberia, eat less and produce less harmful carbon dioxide, when temperatures climb.

When researchers from UC Irvine set out to investigate how climate change was affecting carbon dioxide output by fungi in dryer parts of the Northern Hemisphere, they discovered something altogether surprising, and not at all in line with predictions.

Oftentimes mushrooms feed off of dead vegetation in the soil.  During this process, they emit carbon dioxide that was being stored in that dead matter, into the atmosphere.

Scientists expected warmer than normal soils to emit larger amounts of carbon dioxide because cold temperatures are believed to slow down the process by which fungi convert soil carbon into carbon dioxide.

Even the most environmentally-conscious among us use batteries containing toxic heavy metals on a daily basis. But a discovery made by chemists at Oxford University could one day lead to cleaner batteries for everyone. The researchers recently discovered that an enzyme produced by fungi growing on rotten wood can be used as a cheap and efficient catalyst in fuel cells.

An unusually mild winter in the land of my ancestors has fooled nature into believing spring has arrived. The so-called “killer slug”, a 10-15 cm beast is beginning to eat its way through the new flora, and ticks are ready for suck some blood from anything that bleeds. Even mushrooms have been spotted in a province south of Stockholm.

Read on, one Swedish gardener has a solution for the killer slugs in his [...]