The West is catching on to what the East has known for thousands of years: mushrooms are beneficial to health. They increase immunity, provide vital nutrients, and have been shown to fight cancer. Many of the most powerful medicinal mushrooms like Reishi and Maitake grow wild right all around North America and are easy to find once one knows what to look for.
Even common mushrooms like the puffball and wood ear are found in the Chinese herbal Materia Medica. The wood ear (Tremella fuciformis) is known asBai Mu Erin Chinese, and is used to treat Lung consumption. It can be found growing on stumps and logs in the late summer. To be used medicinally it is dried and then steeped as tea. This mushroom can also be found in soups in many Chinese restaurants. The common puffball (Calvatia booniana) is a large white mushroom appearing in fields and meadows. It also benefits the lungs, but this time helps in situations when the throat is red and burning as well. In the Chinese Materia Medica it is known asMa Bo.
Recently the Shiitake mushroom (Lentinula edodes) was found to contain tremendously increased amounts of vitamin D when dried in the sun. This is a cultivated mushroom in America and is not found wild. It is commonly found in grocery stores and can be purchased fresh and dried in the sun. It can also be grown at home on logs from spores.
Although one of the newest medicinal mushrooms, Agaricus Blazei is rapidly becoming one of the most popular. Reported in a recent survey to be taken by 31% of urological cancer patients in Japan, with the fastest growing US sales of any medicinal mushroom and one of the three most popular medicinal mushrooms in Taiwan, this relative of the common button mushroom, A. bisporus, exhibits broad clinical activity.
