Our Growing Mission
At Northwood Mushrooms Farm
PHOTO BY: SCOTT STREBLE
Mushrooms have an important place in transitioning toward energy descent. In his book “Food Rules,” Michael Pollan quotes a Chinese proverb “eating what stands on one leg [mushrooms and plant foods] is better than what stands on two legs [fowl].” Mushrooms, like legumes and other protein-rich foods from lower on the food chain, require fewer resources than much of the meat we eat, and they are enormously healthy – you could even say medicinal.
We’ve made a special effort to build a farm business that is primarily local, that uses organic practices, and that uses the least amount of embodied energy to grow our mushrooms. We want our farm and local mushroom production to continue for a long time in the future – even with “energy descent,” a probable decline in energy in coming decades.
Our farm is always evolving to match our understanding of growing and distributing mushrooms to customers. While sustainability and overall quality remains a strong value we try to prioritize, our customer’s values of freshness, affordability, and farm transparency have become more important to us.
This balancing of values has led us to our current venues for selling our mushrooms and other products – which are as direct as possible. It has also led us to growing mushrooms in several different ways – so that we can offer a wide variety year-round. While we got our start in growing mushrooms on logs, we now also grow mushrooms in outdoor beds, and indoors on “blocks.”