(+€87,95)
Organic Wine Cap Mushroom Sawdust Spawn
€26,95
USDA Certified Organic
Trusted by 350K+ Growers
Money Back Guarantee
Also known as the "Garden Giant," Wine Cap (Stropharia rugoso-annulata) is a delicious mushroom with a mild, earthy flavor reminiscent of artichokes and potatoes. It's an ideal mushroom for beginners as it colonizes quickly and yields reliable flushes.
Wine Cap can fruit in as little as two months and will produce in the same bed for several years. Fresh woody material (like hardwood chips) can be added each year to maintain the health of the bed. Inoculated material from one bed can also be used as spawn to inoculate new beds!
Recommended use:
- Wine cap sawdust spawn is only recommended for use in outdoor beds.
- Wine cap sawdust spawn must be combined with a substrate (like wood chips) in order to fruit.
- Please note: Wine cap does not grow on logs.
Upon receiving your spawn:
Remove it from the shipping box as soon as possible. Then, unfold the top of the bag, making room for air space. It's also important to check and confirm that the filter patch is not obstructed. This will help the organism breathe and continue to thrive!
Alt: winecap, king stropharia, burgundy mushroom, wine-red stropharia
Cultivation
Click here to download our pamphlet on outdoor bed cultivation using sawdust spawn. Be sure to use clean, untreated products when making outdoor beds.
Inoculation
Wine Cap is a vigorous mushroom that grows naturally on outdoor beds of woody debris. It grows best on straw (not hay), hardwood chips or sawdust. Hardwood recommendations are soft maple, poplar, box elder, and magnolia. They can tolerate a mixture that includes some softwoods - generally no more than 25%. You can also mix different woody materials.
Wine Cap seems to do better if the beds have a variety of particle sizes, such as a mix of both sawdust and wood chips. Avoid branches or other very large pieces of wood as these take longer to colonize and can create too much air space in the bed. Freshly cut wood is preferred, though Wine Cap can also grow well on more aged materials. Many folks are having success with the chip mixes coming from roadside crews pruning under power lines -- and it's a free resource!
Wine Cap does best in partial shade but can tolerate some direct sun. Ideal locations would be at the edge of fields and woods, around the base of trees, in perennial gardens, or as part of the mulch in vegetable gardens, where annual veggies will provide some shade. Once established, Wine Cap beds require little maintenance. During dry periods, the bed can be watered but do not over-water, as excessive watering can suffocate the mycelium.
- In a suitable location, remove any leaves, etc., down to either bare ground or plain grass. No need to dig a trench, but the bed should be in contact with the soil. One bag of sawdust spawn is enough to inoculate approximately 16 square feet.
- Spread mixed woody material over the soil, about 1'' deep.
- Break up the Wine Cap sawdust spawn and evenly sprinkle the spawn on top of the layer of woody debris.
- Add a second layer of woody debris about 2-3'' thick.
- Thoroughly water the bed.
Storing
If you don't plan to use immediately, refrigerate your Wine Cap sawdust spawn. Use within 6 months of receipt.
Cooking
Wine Cap mushrooms are best when braised, grilled, or sauteed. When young, Wine Cap mushrooms can be eaten with the stem and offer a tender yet crunchy texture when lightly cooked in oil. They can also be sliced and mixed into meat sauces or risotto, roasted or braised along with other fall vegetables and served with meat, fowl or fish, added to soups, or stuffed and baked. If using the larger, more mature mushrooms, it is recommended to remove the stems as they become stringy and to slice or chop the cap to ensure even cooking. Wine Cap mushrooms pair well with lemon juice, wine, ramps, nutmeg, fennel, polenta, pasta, quinoa, and rice.
Ingredients
All our spawn is made using organic cultures from our own culture bank. Our sawdust spawn is handmade from a blend of locally sourced, all-natural, organic, and non-GMO woods and supplements from farms and forests in New England and North America.
Cautions & considerations
If you’re going to consume home-grown mushrooms, make sure to cook your fresh mushrooms thoroughly with heat. If it is your first time eating this species, it is best to start with a small amount to check for allergies, even if cooked.
FAQs
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Reviews
G
I purchased this item in the past and had two consecutive years of mushrooms growing in three different patches. I have a 10x10 patch with this purchase hoping for same results. North Spore has never failed
S
Fantastic Results. Advice I wish I was given last year. Inoculate logs later, get 3 of these and border your garden bed with compost or dirt, spread this spawn & cover with wood chips and straw under something that’ll provide shade later & water.
Harvested 4 plus pounds the first weekend of harvest.
Wow, what a great harvest Sheila! Thank you so much for sharing.
N
I ordered 3 bags of wine cap spawn and scattered over our garden beds and topped with wood chips and leaves in fall.
I just noticed tons of big mushrooms growing in one of the beds! They were delicious! (Next time we have to harvest them sooner before bugs get them.)
Thank you North Spore for the quality products and great customer service!
We're so glad the wine caps worked out, Noriko! Please reach out if you ever need anything.
S
My first Wine Cap Mushrooms are coming up. It is exciting!
They are not wine colored, and I wondered what would cause that.
Hello Sylvia!
Thank you so much for taking the time to leave a review! A team member will reach out to you over email shortly to discuss why your wine caps might be missing that classic burgundy color. Thank you for your business!
A
The wood chips I used were too soft, but luckily I used some logs and sticks to border my bed - it took a few months but one day the mushrooms popped up under the logs! This year I’m using some nice hard wood chips and getting MORE spawn. These are amazing. Thank you
Your wine caps look amazing, Alisa! Thank you for taking the time to share your experience. Our team is here to help if you ever need anything!
K
I tried growing few varieties of mushrooms in our garden this year (very low tech) and wine caps are definitely a keeper!!! I inoculated woodchips in my raised beds in January, three months later we harvested our first flush of "garden giants"😁 They are so easy to grow and so delicious!!!
Thanks for sharing, Kay! Your review made our day. Our team is here to help if you ever need anything.
D
I was blown away by how easy it was to inoculate my garden beds with these mushrooms, and how quickly they came up. I got at least 3 huge flushes of mushrooms in late summer after putting the spawn down in May. I ended up drying whatever we didn’t use in cooking, keeping us in mushrooms for months to come.
We really appreciate the kind review, Danielle! (And thanks for sharing the pics, too!)
B
I inoculated unknown wood chips I got from a neighbor in the fall of 2023 and the mycelium took off within a few weeks. We watered the chips over the fall and then let the winter rains take over. Fast forward to March 3 of 2024 and we have our first harvest! Whoo!
Awesome, Brieanne! We really appreciate you taking the time to share your experience. Our team is here if you need anything!
H
We had a great experience with the wine cap mushroom spawn. We created multiple beds, some with straw & some with wood chips - all yielded fruit within about a year! Just don't forget to check them regularly, or you will be sad to find big mushrooms past their prime.
We're so glad the wine caps worked out! Our team is here if you need anything!
V
We are extremely happy with the results from this product. We made a deciduous sawdust bed in our forest not far from a pond, about 6' square, in the spring. In August after a heavy rain we got our first flush of beautiful mushrooms! It has been a lot of fun watching for them, and of course, eating them!
We really appreciate you taking the time to share your experience, Victoria! Beautiful work!
A
I purchased a bag of wine cap spawn and with in a month had my first mushroom!! I got free wood chips from the road side delivery and it provided my mushrooms with lots of food. I planted them under my rose bush and even my rose bush has started doing better thanks to the symbiotic relationship. I've even been able to spread the mycelium around the garden. Every time the weather gets wet and then warms up a flush of about 15 shows up. It's my absolute favorite.
Your review made our day, Ashley! Thanks for taking the time to share your experience. The team is here to help if you ever need anything.
R
Excellent. Spawn placed I. Prepared bed per instructions. Had mushrooms the same year and they were delicious!
We're so glad everything is working out for you, Richard! Thanks for taking the time to share your experience!
D
I bought wine cap sawdust spawn back in the early spring. I carefully followed all instructions and videos provided. And nothing. I reached out to support and they were very responsive, but they told me that it could take up to a year to see results. That is okay, but the website says that you could see results within 2 months. This needs to change so that others would have the proper expectations. I will impatiently wait until next spring to see if anything comes up.
Thank you for sharing your experience and feedback. We appreciate your patience while waiting for your wine caps to establish, and we understand the excitement of wanting to see results. We’ll be sure to share your feedback with our team as we continue working to set clear expectations for growers. We hope you have a great harvest when they appear!
N
I bought the Wine Cap mushroom block last fall. Set up a 4 x 4 bed and spread the spawn. I didn't get anything until June. They have flushed (bloomed) 4 times now and have escaped the bed. I have more mushrooms than I can eat. I have dehydrated and jarred 10 quarts of mushrooms. I have given pounds away to friends. I am trying to find out if there is a way to turn them off for awhile and not kill them. I really wasn't expecting to be getting this many mushrooms. It is a good problem to have.
Thank you for sharing your experience! Enjoy the harvest, and thanks for growing with us.
N
I’m happy to get.
F
They grow awesome
T
I couldn't be happier! I split up the spore into a few small spots in my garden as more of a test run to see which area would be the best. Then I worried because it seemed like nothing was happening and I thought I must have messed it up. But this IS northwestern Montana and an exceptionally dismal spring we've had. Then, bestill my heart, in the two warmest of the spots I added spawn, a miracle! The weather is supposed to warm up more over the next week, so I hope to see more fruiting bodies in the other two locations.
Having never tasted winecaps before, I harvested a few of different sizes and that was also a revelation. They are delicious, although the larger mushroom's stem was pretty chewy. Younger mushrooms were perfect, stem and cap. The older ones would still be delicious in a braise, chopped fine for risotto or just save the stems in the freezer for when I make mushroom stock.
This experience has me looking at all my garden beds, thinking about how many mushrooms I could grow!
W
I bought the spawn last year. Followed the instructions and got mushrooms this spring. It was that easy
K
Must have for the garden! Spawn looked great and was just perfect!
Thank you for sharing, Katelinn! Our team is here to help if you ever need anything.
C
We harvested way more than we could even use!! Big ones, small ones - this was awesome!! I will be growing these every year!!
So great to hear! Congratulations and please reach out if you ever need anything.
S
Northspore spawn is like no other. The mushrooms took a bit to establish. But after? We were quickly overgrown!!! We started begging friends to take mushrooms off our hands. Will be purchasing every year!
Wow, Stephanie! What an amazing Wine Cap harvest. Thank you for sharing and please reach out if you ever need anything!
J
Prompt delivery. What happens in hot weather? Do they go dormant?
Thanks for sharing, James! Yes, if temps are over 80F, the mycelium will start slowing down. Make sure your bed has plenty of shade and does not dry out!
J
Exciting day. I prepared a 10"straw bed with a cardboard base and sawdust spawn on March 9th. 9 weeks later they are popping.
Congratulations, Jeff! Thanks so much for sharing.
A
Love this sawdust spawn! Works great!