April blossomed nicely at Collar City Mushrooms! With the warming weather we were able to receive some early gifts from the forest and start foraging for the May Foraged festival! We fed a lively group of guests at our spring dinner on the farm, we meditated, we poemed, we engaged in the mushroom symposium, we stretched our bodies with some vinyasa flow yoga, and we spread our mycelium!
Our gofundme has raised nearly 10% of its goal! We are so grateful for everyone’s donations and shares. The building purchase process is beginning on June 1 and this extra boost will go a long way to helping us expand into our new grow rooms!
https://www.gofundme.com/f/collar-city-mushrooms-phase-2
The Shroomwagon is back on the road and making deliveries!
The Meaty Max Spring Dinner Event was another sold out evening. They made vegan beet sliders topped with mushroom bacon and Tray Farms micro greens, tikka masala skewers on a bed of amaranth, and mini key lime lion’s mane cheesecakes with date crusts!
The Soulfire Farm team visited for a tour with a mycologist speaker who had run a workshop at their farm. They are now added to our roster of farms picking up our spent compost blocks.
On Instagram you can follow soulfire farms @soulfirefarm and Darren le Baron @darren_le_baron .
Check out Soulfire farm’s website here:
2nd Street Farms also grabbed a few bins of compost to use in community raised bed garden spaces in Troy’s 5th district.
On April 19th the Sanctuary for Independent Media hosted the virtual symposium: Ending the Prohibition of the Mind: a Mushroom Symposium. This incredible event featured 3 New York State Assemblymembers, lawyers, and counselors from across the state and we hosted a watch party at the farm to take it in and discuss what we can do to help create change. We have organized a Psilocybin Action Committee to work towards making this medicine available to all who would benefit from it! (May 10th at 7pm is our first meeting)
Here’s the youtube link to the entire symposium in case you missed it:
Here’s an unrelated youtube video by “Stoneageman” about demystifying psilocybin containing mushrooms and an experience he had in Jamaica, where Psilocybe Mushrooms are legal.
Avery attended a virtual CEO roundtable discussion through the Rensselaer Chamber of Commerce with other local businesses.
Amanda, the cocktail crafter at Nighthawk’s, created an incredible bourbon drink with our mushrooms!
Collar City Cold Pressed started carrying our mushrooms for a regular Tuesday grain bowl dish and they secured some wild foraged ramps to make a special cream cheese. Both items were so good! Plus they make smoothies using our mushroom powders!
Follow their instagram @collarcitycoldpressed
Ovenbird baking has made us a North Troy pick up spot for their pre-orders as well as a drop in spot for a variety of their fresh baked products! Follow their instagram @ovenbird_baking
We now carry Troy Based Tray Farms micro greens in our retail shop
Our Bliss Arts Curated Pink Full Moon Poetry and Percussion event was a great night! Diotte Sorelle and Avery performed to an intimate crowd with a few participatory pieces, call and response songs, and meditations!
Our book club met to discuss the final few chapters of Christopher Hobbs’ book: Medicinal Mushrooms. We talked about the tincture and extract making processes and shared the mushroom based samples we each created.
We launched yet another new web page that has long been in the works thanks to Jiwoo from Emma Willard: The Art of Mushrooms
Capital Roots used some of our compost blocks to help restore the soil in a new plot they are planting in Schenectady!
518 Wood Fired Pizza made a crispy delicious looking pizza at their shop!
Superior Merchandise Co. started carrying our pre-packaged fresh mushrooms in their brand new cooler:
Eric, the Tastechicks chef, created a Reuben pop up at Superior Merchandise Co. using our lion’s mane mushrooms.
We’re in discussion with 2 different brewers about creating mushroom beers! More news to come soon!
One of our regular mushroom friends borrowed 2 different dried foraged mushrooms, made a plaster mold, and cast them in aluminum!
Indian Ladder Farms continues to churn out amazing vegan dishes with our mushrooms:
Albany Victory gardens hosted an earth day BBQ and they were able to harvest mushrooms that had grown from our compost blocks!
Upcoming
May 7th Collar City Mushrooms and Bliss Arts presents: Artist Jonn Paul and the
Groovebeats with mushroom based foods by Corinne and Dave. Suggested donation of $10.
May 10th: The Mushroom Symposium through the Sanctuary was a resounding success. Many people asked how to be more involved in creating change and so we have decided to form a Psilocybin Action Committee. Our first meeting will be Tuesday, May 10th at 7pm. Join us to see how we can help to end the prohibition of the mind and exercise our right to consciousness!
May 12th: Book Club from 7pm – 8pm: we will be reading the first 54 pages of Paul Stamet’s book Mycelium Running.
May 24th: The Power of Mushrooms: a talk at Balance Massage Studio and Healing Center 6pm – 7pm. Register for this talk by calling the studio: 518-475-9999
See more of their events here:
http://www.balancemassageandhealingartsstudio.com/classes/
May 25th through 28th FORAGED New York: Troy’s Wild Food Festival. THis multi day event will include foraging walks lead by Sean Rowe (follow him on instagram @rentaforager_ ) dishes and drinks made at a variety of Trojan spots (Nighthawks, Naughters, Whiskey Pickle, Donna’s Italian, the Little Viking Co. and more)
https://www.foragednewyork.org/
Follow the instagram page @foraged.ny
June 11th Dinner On the Farm with Matt Olley from Little Viking. More information about this Dinner will be coming shortly, but it is certainly going to be vegan and absolutely delicious.
June 21: Mushrooms, Mycology, and More talk at the Berne Town Library 6:30pm – 7:30pm.
July 1: Mohawk Harbor Mushroom Walk and Talk as part of the Albany Symphony Orchestra American Music Festival Trailblaze, NY concert series 11am – 12:30pm
See more of their concert series details here:
https://www.albanysymphony.com/trailblazeny
Plus our regularly occurring events:
Second Sunday Poetry and Prose Open Mic: Sunday May 8th at 2pm.
Meditation Amongst the Mushrooms every other Tuesday at 7pm (May 3, May 17, and May 31)
Moon inspired Yoga with Maria Diotte every other Friday at 7pm (May 13 and 27)
In honor of National Poetry Month, here’s a fungi based poem:
“The Mycelium Spreads”
The mycelium spreads
Growing into and through all it connects
Weaving a web of tenacious threads
Hyphal nodes
That layer and layer and layer
Building upon each other
Intertwining
Combining
Condensing
Building upon each other
Layer upon layer upon layer
Forming new structures
Stretching
Reaching
Growing
Creating fruit from which spores can fly
Filling the sky
A shower of potential in search of food, of water, of each other
condensing
combining
Intertwining
Forming new structures
The mycelium spreads
Collar City Mushrooms 