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Through Fungus, Allergy and Traditional medicine
To ensure safety, wild mushrooms must be correctly identified before their edibility can be assumed. Deadly poisonous mushrooms that are frequently confused with edible mushrooms include several species of the genus Amanita, particularly A. phalloides (the death cap). Some mushrooms that are edible for most people can cause allergic reactions in others; old or improperly stored specimens can cause food poisoning. Additionally, mushrooms can absorb chemicals from polluted locations, accumulating pollutants and potentially lethal heavy metals.
Psychoactive mushrooms can also be confused with edible species. Additionally, mushrooms were consumed medicinally in traditional medicine, but are not upheld by evidence. Edible species typically must be cooked, sometimes requiring parboiling or slow cooking to destroy toxins, with only select species able to be eaten raw. Many can also be canned, dried, pickled, or salted.
Description
Edibility may be defined by criteria including desirable taste and aroma and the absence of poisonous effects on humans. Edible mushrooms are consumed for their nutritional and culinary value. Mushrooms, especially dried shiitake, are sources of umami flavor. Edible mushrooms include many fungal species that are either harvested wild or cultivated.
Wild mushrooms can appear either below ground (hypogeous) or above ground (epigeous) and can be picked by hand. Correct identification is required to prevent the confusion of potentially fatal poisonous mushrooms with edible ones. Some edible species cannot be identified without the use of advanced techniques such as chemistry or microscopy.
Easily cultivated and common wild mushrooms are often available in grocery stores and farmers' markets when in season; those that are more difficult to obtain (such as the truffle, matsutake, and morel) may be collected on a smaller scale and are sometimes even sold as luxury items. Mushrooms can be purchased fresh and many are also sold dried. Many species require cooking to eliminate toxicity.
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List of provisionally edible mushrooms
Cultivation
Mushroom cultivation has a long history, with over twenty species commercially cultivated. Mushrooms are cultivated in at least 60 countries. A fraction of the many fungi consumed by humans are currently cultivated and sold commercially. Commercial cultivation is important ecologically, as there have been concerns of the depletion of larger fungi such as chanterelles in Europe, possibly because the group has grown popular yet remains a challenge to cultivate. Some mushrooms, particularly mycorrhizal species, have not yet been successfully cultivated.
In 2023, world production of commercial mushrooms and recorded truffle collection reported to the Food and Agriculture Organization was 50 million tonnes, led by China with 94% of the total (table).
Safety concerns
Some wild species are toxic, or at least indigestible, when raw. Failure to identify poisonous mushrooms and confusing them with edible ones has resulted in death. Some mobile applications exist to aid with identification, but are unreliable on their own, especially those based on artificial intelligence.
Deadly poisonous mushrooms that are frequently confused with edible mushrooms and responsible for many fatal poisonings include several species of the genus Amanita, particularly A. phalloides (the death cap). Some mushrooms that are edible for most people can cause allergic reactions in some individuals with no prior knowledge of an allergy; old or improperly stored specimens can go rancid quickly and cause food poisoning. When eating any fungus for the first time, only a small quantity of one species should be consumed at a time, allowing for several hours to identify any potential allergic reaction. Even normally edible species of mushrooms may be dangerous, as certain mushrooms growing in polluted locations can act as chemical-absorbers, accumulating pollutants and heavy metals, including cadmium and arsenic, sometimes in lethal concentrations. On the other hand, cooking preparations may reduce the toxicity of certain slightly poisonous mushrooms (e.g. Morchellas) enough to be consumed.
Additionally, several varieties of fungi are known and documented to contain psychedelic drugs—the so-called magic mushrooms—yet resemble perfectly edible, non-psychoactive species. While not necessarily lethal to consume, to the uninitiated, an accidentally induced psychedelic experience can run the gamut from benign to terrifying, even depressing or psychotic. The most commonly consumed for recreational psychoactive use are Amanita muscaria (the fly agaric) and Psilocybe cubensis, with the former containing alkaloids such as muscimol and the latter predominately psilocybin. Both have the potential to induce in the user feelings of awe, wonder with nature, interesting visual hallucinations and inner peace (even in mild doses), but excessive or accidental consumption can create feelings of insanity, helplessness and fear, usually persisting for a few hours.
Nutrition
Boiled white mushrooms are 91% water, 5% carbohydrates, 2% protein, and 0.3% fat (table). In a reference amount of 100 grams (3.5 oz), boiled white mushrooms supply 28 calories of food energy and rich contents (20% or more of the Daily Value, DV) of riboflavin, niacin, and pantothenic acid, copper, and selenium (23-56% DV), with a moderate content of potassium (12% DV, table).
Vitamin D
The content of vitamin D is absent or low unless mushrooms are exposed to sunlight or purposely treated with artificial ultraviolet light, even after harvesting and being processed into dry powder.
When exposed to UV light before or after harvest, mushrooms convert their large concentrations of ergosterol into vitamin D2. This is similar to the reaction in humans, where vitamin D3 is synthesized after exposure to sunlight.
Testing showed an hour of UV light exposure before harvesting made a serving of mushrooms contain twice the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's daily recommendation of vitamin D. With 5 minutes of artificial UV light exposure after harvesting, a serving of mushrooms contained four times as much. Slicing the mushrooms before UV expose can increase their content ten-fold. Analysis also demonstrated that natural sunlight produced vitamin D2.
The form of vitamin D found in UV-irradiated mushrooms is ergocalciferol, or vitamin D2. This is not the same as cholecalciferol, called vitamin D3, which is produced by UV-irradiation of human or animal skin, fur, and feathers. Although vitamin D2 has vitamin-D activity in humans, and is widely used in food fortification and nutritional supplements, vitamin D3 is more commonly used in dairy and cereal products.
Research
A 2021 review of prospective studies found that eating mushrooms did not significantly affect risk factors for cardiovascular diseases.
Uses
The accurate determination of and proper identification of a species is required to ensure its edibility and to safeguard against poisoning.
History
The earliest evidence of consumption of mushrooms comes from 13,000-year-old archaeological sites in Chile. Ötzi, the mummy of a man who lived between 3400 and 3100 BCE in Europe, was found with two types of mushroom in his belongings. Ancient Romans and Greeks, particularly the upper classes, used mushrooms for culinary purposes. Food tasters were employed by Roman emperors to ensure that mushrooms were safe to eat. The Forme of Cury, a 14th-century compilation of medieval English recipes, features a recipe of mushrooms and leeks cooked in broth.
Culinary
A minimal amount of water should be used to clean specimens, ideally in the field. Only select species can be safely eaten raw.
Cooking
Cooking mushrooms before consumption is often required, both to eliminate mycotoxins, including trace levels of toxic hydrazines, and also to improve palatability and texture. Frying, roasting, baking, and microwaving are all used to prepare mushrooms. Cooking lowers the amount of water present in the food. Chitin, a structural polymer in the cell walls of mushrooms, does not break down until 380 °C (716 °F), which is not reached in any normal cooking. However, chitin connections may be broken down by cooking, allowing for easier digestion.
Storage
Mushrooms should be used as soon as possible, even if refrigerated (particularly Coprinus species). Mushrooms can be frozen, but they freeze best when cooked first. Those that do not require cooking can also be canned, dried, pickled, or salted.
In traditional medicine
Medicinal mushrooms are mushrooms or extracts from mushrooms that are thought to be treatments for diseases, yet remain unconfirmed in mainstream science and medicine, and so are not approved as drugs or medical treatments. Such use of mushrooms therefore falls into the domain of traditional medicine for which there is no direct high-quality clinical evidence of efficacy. (Since about the mid-20th century, some compounds found in fungi have been developed scientifically for medicine, e.g. antibiotics.)
Preliminary research on mushroom extracts has been conducted to determine if anti-disease properties exist, such as for polysaccharide-K or lentinan. Some extracts have widespread use in Japan, Korea and China, as potential adjuvants for radiation treatments and chemotherapy.