About a year ago, my husband got a package of Mud/Wtr in the mail. He had ordered it after seeing its benefits praised on social media and thought we should give it a try. You might be asking yourself: “What the heck is Mud/Wtr?”
That’s exactly what I asked.
Since then, I have been inundated with ads on social media for mushroom coffee. Dose, the Oprah Winfrey-approved Clevr, Ryze, Four Sigmatic Think and La Republica Superfoods are but a handful of the varieties that have flooded this trending market, as well as proprietary brands from Kroger and Whole Foods.
Some of these brands don’t actually contain coffee; Mud/Wtr, for instance, contains black tea. Others, such as Everyday Dose, offer instant coffee that’s practically undetectable in taste but has less caffeine than your regular cup of joe. What these brands peddle is a powdered blend of medicinal and culinary mushrooms with adaptogenic properties that purportedly enhance focus and improve energy. Some even claim to help with weight loss.
Most are easy to use: Simply heat hot water and stir in the recommended amount (usually 1 tablespoon) and add whatever you like in your coffee (from oat milk to coconut oil and beyond — these brands encourage you to get creative).
Credit: Meridith Ford
Credit: Meridith Ford
What, if anything, actually is going on here? Is this all a bunch of hooey or do mushroom coffees really work?
“Mushrooms have been used for hundreds to thousands of years, mainly in China and India, both as food and as medicine, including for their adaptogenic properties,” said Alissa Palladino, a registered dietitian-nutritionist and the media representative for the Georgia Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. Adaptogenic compounds help the body respond better to stress.
“As a supplement,” Palladino said, “they can be taken in powder form, capsule form or, more recently, blended with coffee beans to make ‘mushroom coffee.’”
It seems the coffee — or, in some cases, tea — simply is the vehicle for getting the fungi into your digestive system, so their health benefits can get to work on the rest of you.
“It’s important to note that the research showing these benefits has been on the mushrooms in various forms, including supplements, but not mushroom coffee specifically, so we can only extrapolate that these benefits would hold,” Palladino said, adding that she found no research to conclude that mushroom coffees or powders help with weight loss.
“There are a few ways brands are offering and marketing various versions of mushroom coffee,” said Alex Maes, director of coffee and head roaster at Land of a Thousand Hills, which has coffee shops throughout the Atlanta area and across the U.S. “Some are not actually coffee, but blends of dried mushrooms and other spices and vitamins, like Mud/Wtr.”
Maes said some other brands, such as Ryze, use similar recipes, but add freeze-dried coffee or coffee extracts. Powdered proteins in the form of collagen sometimes are added. Land of a Thousand Hills partners with NuYu, a brand that infuses mushroom blends with LTH coffee beans.
“We don’t currently have any mushroom-infused coffees on our menus or available for sale on any of our platforms,” Maes said, adding the primary reason is that “it is just not part of our brand identity.”
But Maes didn’t rule out the possibility of an LTH mushroom coffee in the future.
If you’re thinking you can just go out and grind up a bunch of bunapi for your morning cup, you’re not entirely wrong. The key is that these brands make it easier for you to get your daily dose of focus-improving fungi by blending them together in an easy-to-mix mélange that can be served hot or over ice.
Credit: Meridith Ford
Credit: Meridith Ford
Depending on what you might add, they taste anywhere from meh to invigorating. Mud/Wtr’s OG blend tastes more like chai than coffee (because it is) and needs help from a creamer and sweetener (I used milk and honey).
Several brands offer starter packs that contain rechargeable frothers, guidebooks and marketing materials. Online reviews are encouraged.
Most of the brands are a blend of reishi, cordyceps, lion’s mane, turkey tail and chaga.
“These mushrooms are high in a number of essential vitamins and minerals,” Palladino said, “including vitamin D if the mushrooms have been UV treated, plus B vitamins, phosphorus, potassium, copper and selenium.”
Plus, they are low in fat and calories, offer anti-inflammatory properties and are high in antioxidants, which “neutralize free radicals and protect the body from oxidative damage that contributes to disease,” Palladino said.
Mushroom coffee blends aren’t cheap. A starter pack can run anywhere from $60 to $90 for about 30 servings. But you can find deals on social media; the marketing of these products is perhaps the cleverest thing about them. In the zeitgeist of today’s healthy eating environment, mushroom coffees offer a shiny new alternative to coffee that appeals to the hippie in all of us.
But if you’re not into the hype, just saute some shrooms and enjoy.
Meridith Ford is a chef and food writer who owns Cremalosa gelateria in Decatur.
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