Are your mushrooms cultivated on natural organic materials? Yes

Mushrooms cultivated on natural materials in natural light have the full complement of vitamins, minerals, and naturally produced active compounds. These are mushrooms grown as nature intended.

Remember, like many plants, mushrooms are a product of their environment. They draw minerals from their growth medium or substrate, and water from the same substrate or rain. If the substrate is high in certain minerals, the mushrooms will absorb more of these minerals. If the growth medium has certain compounds that can be used as building blocks or precursors for important active compounds, then the mushroom will be able to produce those compounds readily and efficiently.

The growth medium or substrate is very important for the natural production of the active compounds specific to different species of mushrooms.

Although mushroom powders are superior to MOG powders, they are still less potent than a concentrated extract. Traditional Chinese Medicine, which has used mushrooms and herbs for thousands of years, almost always makes a tea from herbs. Tea is a simple water extract. Traditional Chinese Medicine practitioners will boil herbs for long periods of time to extract the medicinal compounds.

A hot water extract is a very simple and effective way to concentrate mushrooms and at the same time make them more bio-available. The combined use of alcohol and water is utilized when some important compounds in the mushroom are not water soluble, such as Reishi or Chaga triterpenoids.

Medicinal Mushrooms are the most powerful natural healing substances.
They are classified as “Adaptogens” meaning that they support the body to heal and balance itself holistically.
Adaptogens support your body to naturally regulate itself by normalizing over activity or under activity of the organs and glands.
Most nutritional supplements deliver ingredients in an isolated state whereas Medicinal Mushroom supplements are consumed in a whole state where each ingredient or aspect synergistically supports other ingredients to deliver their benefits optimally. There is a very high level of bio-availability of a properly grown and processed Medicinal Mushroom product.
More and more people – doctors among them – have become aware that when it comes to preventing illness and disease, food plays a major role. This shift toward good nutrition as the key to a long, healthy life isn't just based on anecdotal evidence. A growing body of medical research is backing the old adage that “you are what you eat.” This nutritional research is also finding that not all foods are equal. When it comes to good nutrition some are better than others.
Researchers and health practitioners are identifying what they call “super foods” – foods shown to have tremendous health benefits, including the ability to help prevent many diseases.
The super foods theory has led to increased studies on the health benefits of specific foods, with mushrooms being one food that has received much recent attention. And what researchers are finding is that mushrooms really do provide many high level health benefits.
Mushrooms are complex biological organisms that contain numerous bioactive nutrients and antioxidants.
High in antioxidants, beta-glucans and polysaccharides, mushrooms are one of nature’s most perfect foods.
Not only are they loaded with healthy nutrients, but those nutrients are easily absorbed and used by humans. Recent research has focused on a unique potent antioxidant in mushrooms – called L-Ergothioneine (ERGO) – as a natural way of nutritionally supporting your body’s immune system.
ERGO appears to be a far more powerful antioxidant than other substances such as beta-carotene and vitamins C and E. One unit of synthetic ERGO antioxidant is equal to 7,000 units of the antioxidant Trolox (water soluble vitamin E.) Antioxidants are the body’s defense system against cellular damage.
Research has shown that the ERGO antioxidant found in mushrooms is not only one of the most potent of antioxidants but also the one most efficiently used by the body. Humans possess a unique specific “transport” system that moves ERGO into important cells in the body, such as the red and white blood cells. And unlike antioxidants such as vitamins C and E, unused ERGO appears to be stored by the body for quick use rather than flushed as waste.
The awareness that nutrition plays a key role in promoting good health has led to the growth of the multi-billion dollar nutritional supplement market.
The purpose of all of these nutritional supplements is to provide the body with the nutrients it needs to thrive, protecting us from today’s increased health challenges and supporting us to live longer, healthier lives.
Since most of us no longer eat properly or cannot get the full array of nutrients we require from our nutrient depleted foods, we have come to depend on these nutritional supplements, such as vitamin pills, to fill in the gaps. The problem, however, is that most of these supplements on which we rely often contain synthetic or extracted chemicals and nutrients whose absorption, cell penetration and physiologic effects are questionable.
Most nutrition experts today agree that the best nutrition comes from whole foods. The cellular processes of humans is complex and needs a complex food to match. Mushrooms, as it turns out, are one of the most complex foods available, containing more than 3,000 specific chemicals that match the system requirements of humans. The best advice for good nutrition should perhaps not be "Eat your vegetables" but instead, "Eat your mushrooms."

The majority of medicinal mushrooms are known for their active polysaccharides, called beta-D-glucans. Some mushrooms like Reishi also have triterpenoid compounds.
Take note of whether these compounds are listed and quantified. If they are, make sure the company can support this claim with actual testing documentation. Some companies list multiple “active” compounds without any actual testing results.
Don’t be fooled by high polysaccharide numbers. Polysaccharides can simply be starch, which is an alpha glucan and a major component of grain. Grain is commonly found in mycelium products.

Some companies make the claim that their product has “all stages”,
or is a “unique combination” of mushrooms and mycelium.
They may also claim this is therefore “full spectrum”. They make further claims that this provides a more diverse menu of medicinal compounds. A mushroom and its mycelium are actually made of similar tissue, but with important differences.
Mushrooms are genetically more complex and have more medicinal properties. Look to see if the companies that make this claim actually give you a percentage of each fungal part.
One company that makes this claim uses only 10% mushroom in one of their products. Another doesn’t even state how much of their mycelium product is actual mushroom.
Don’t be fooled. Mushrooms are more expensive to grow but are of higher value and therefore likely to be left out or included in small amounts just to make the claim of being present.
Also, there are 2 methods for growing mycelium:
1. Solid Fermentation: Grown on grains or rice where the end
product is up to 70% growing medium of no medicinal value.
2. Liquid Fermentation: Grown in liquid and fed supportive
nutrients so the end product is 100 % mycelium with zero filler.

What actually does a full spectrum mushroom product mean?
Generally speaking, this means that the product in question has all the major components of the mushroom present. So an analysis of the product would show a profile that matches the data that is present in major published research or government databases.
For example, the USDA has a database of foods and natural products that lists nutritional information based on approved analytical tests.
If the product is a mushroom extract, full spectrum would indicate that the naturally occurring components would remain in approximately the same ratio as the mushroom itself.
How is it possible then that mycelium grown on grain or rice, which is part of the final mycelium product, can be full spectrum?
It simply can’t be, by definition. Whether you have pure mycelium or a real mushroom, the addition of grain negates a claim of full spectrum.
It gets worse when one realizes that the majority of the MOG product is actually grain.
Our products are 100% naturally produced mushrooms. This is the true definition of Full Spectrum.

We use 100% pure mushroom (fruiting bodies) in all of our extracts. There are no added binders, fillers, starch, grain, and/or mycelium.

Maybe you used to try a mycelium product that is produced in a sterile laboratory? This fungal mycelium is generally grown on sterile rice or grain. These grains are sterilized inside a plastic bag for hours at over 100 degrees C. The substrate material, rather than being a rich diverse nutritional matrix, is ordinary and featureless grain. Nutritionally grain primarily consists of starch.