2023 is off to a solid start! We are entering our third year of operation and have 23 months of ever increasing growth. With that data it is time to move forward with buying 333 2nd avenue and spread our mycelium into the second floor! Our meeting with the SBA and city representatives went very well and we are on the cusp of being awarded a significant grant! Our next step is to line up a lender for the purchase of the building and sign some papers! While we work on that process, here’s some of the activities in January that are moving us along!
Our January dinner on the farm by Chef Dave Chaiken included a variety of dishes inspired by the cuisine from countries in Asia.
We mixed it up at the Albany Capital Center during the Albany Food and Wine Festival! Dave and Corinne crafted two delightful small plate treats that we presented with Bonterra wines. Amy arranged an absolutely stunning display of fresh mushrooms that wowed the crowd!
We hosted another Knit Wits Amongst the Mushrooms.
And several meditation sessions, including another Sound Journey by the Divinely Guided Wellness team.
Emma Willard student Suri joined us for another semester and Bob has started learning the ins and outs of mushroom farming as well!
2023 is going to be a huge growth year for us, so we have begun to build our team to support the increased number of mushrooms we are growing and moving! Azure and Sam have joined us so far!
Two new restaurant / catering spots started carrying our fresh mushrooms: Daley’s on Yates in Schenectady and the Prime Cafe on the Regeneron Campus in Rensselaer.
Boyscout troop 1701 from Latham visited for a field trip and mycology lesson!
Students from Middletown High School joined us virtually for a tour and fungi talk!
Our Ramen Soup Popup was a delicious success.
We introduced a few new products (and brought back a fan favorite). We will be putting out small batches of energy orbes, lion’s mane cookies, and shiitake ginger dumplings. They will be new items you’ll find in our shop as regularly as we can produce them! (All vegan too!)
The Shrooms game is in stock. A beautifully illustrated game about foraging mushrooms! $80 plus tax for this limited first edition game (only 132 copies were made).
And copies of A Pioppino for Santino and Amongst the Mushrooms are on our shelves!
We cooked up this incredible taste bomb of a dish to try out! A succulent shawarma stack of oyster mushrooms!
Avery was interviewed by Kate Ray for her blog “Soft Leaves.” The topic was secret or often used ingredients, and suffice to say, the word “Mushroom” came up a lot!
Subscribe to her blog here, or follow our social media to catch the link when we share it!
Avery was also interviewed live on air for the Farm Hour program on WIOX 91.3 out of Roxbury.
A link to the audio will be shared once we get it!
The link for the Second episode of Indian Ladder Farms’ Agricultural Acts podcast featuring Avery and Amy was posted at the end of December. This episode focuses on the Ganoderma Saison they brewed and our Psilocybin Advocacy. You can listen in here:
The article by Sara Foss in Modern Farmer came out with lots of mushroom news from around the state:
Here are a couple restaurant partner treats that featured our mushrooms:
Indian Ladder Farms:
The Scarlet Knife:
Psilocybin Corner:
We met with the Troy City Council to discuss psilocybin use and the changing laws across the country.
You can watch the full meeting on the City Council’s Youtube station:
Our NYPAC / NYMHA legislative committee meets weekly to discuss ways we can encourage more New York Lawmakers to sponsor the bills currently in the legislature.
Avery was Interviewed by Isaac, a junior journalist, from The Nation for a piece on psilocybin advocacy. A link to the article will be coming soon.
On Feb 7th we have an all day capital walk through with 10 lawmaker meetings scheduled. Then in the evening we will be gathering at the mushroom farm to discuss our progress so far. If you are interested in seeing how you can help, come on down at 7pm and join in, or attend virtually through zoom here:
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/89607711935?pwd=VExlUXRxUVZBS2dLMmlUN09TZUU2dz09
Meeting ID: 896 0771 1935
Passcode: 053866
COMING SOON:
Our February Dinner with Chef Dave on 2/11 is already sold out.
Our March dinner with Chef Chris will be available for purchase through Eventbrite on Feb 21st, but we’ve already sold 6 tickets through the store (come right to 333 2nd ave or any of our other sales spots to purchase and avoid the Eventbrite fees). This dinner will absolutely sell out, so get them soon!
We’ll be discussing Peter McCoy’s latest book in our book club this month:
If you’re interested in joining send us an email (collarcitymushrooms@gmail.com)
There will be no meditation sessions in February! We’ll resume in March! Stay tuned!
HVCC CLass Mushrooms, Mycelium and More Taught by Avery in April only has 6 seats left!
Register here: https://www.hvcc.edu/programs/community-education/schedules/leisure-special-interest.html#Mushrooms,MyceliumandMore
Monday 2/27 from 7 – 9 HVCC Community Education Cooking with Mushrooms taught by Averystill has a few seats left.
https://www.hvcc.edu/programs/community-education/schedules/cooking.html#CookingwithMushrooms
A long way off:
May 17-20th: Foraged NY returns to Troy with multiple days of wild food fun! Stay tuned to www.foragednewyork.org for details.
June 17: Rosendale Theater Fungi Film Festival: a day long celebration of fungi on film with walks, talks, and poetry readings! It’s not yet listed on their website, but details will be distributed as we get them.
July 15: Indian Ladder Farms Farming Man festival. We’ll be vending at Farming man again! It’s a great way to get some music and have some fun on th e beautiful grounds of Indian Ladder Farms.
September 29th – October 1st: For the Love of Fungi at the Ashokan Center
Albany’s Veg Fest is also scheduled for October 1st. We’re looking for advice on doing two things at the same time hundreds of miles apart… please help.
Here’s a neat video of a group of people in the Netherlands who grew a pavilion using mycelium!
The Growing Pavilion Documentary Dutch
That’s all for now!
Collar City Mushrooms 