Features:

• Versatile
• Nutrient-rich
• Dramatic flavor

King Oyster mushrooms are native to Mediterranean regions of Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa and are the largest mushroom in the oyster family.

The distinctive shape of the King Oyster mushroom lends itself to a variety of innovative cooking techniques, including searing them sliced in the fashion of scallops. When freshly picked and uncooked, King Oysters are almost tasteless and have very little scent to them, but when cooked, they deliver an incredible umami flavor and a meaty texture.

• Class: Agaricomycetes - Parasitic, pathogenic, symbiotic, or saprotrophic; most are terrestrial, with few aquatic members; all are mushroom-forming; spore cap has openings; contains 17 orders.
• Order: Agaricales - Most are saprotrophic, some are parasitic on plants (causing root rot), others are mycorrhizal; basidia produced in layers (hymenia) on the underside of fleshy fruiting bodies (basidiocarps), in tubes (boletes), or on gills (mushrooms).
• Family: Pleurotus small to medium-sized mushrooms which have white spores; gilled mushrooms
• Species: P. eryngii

This kit is designed to help you learn to grow mushrooms at home without any specialized equipment. They are fairly easy to work with and include instructions for growing them on a bag of precooked rice at home or a bucket of straw if you'd like to grow a lot of them.

Each set includes detailed instructions, your mushroom culture, and a fungi word search. It's a great project for anyone with a love of plants, to do as part of a nature study, or simply because they are beautiful and fascinating. And they're great for cooking with/eating or just looking at if you’re the non-mushroom-eating type.

This is a pretty flexible project age-wise, with the only caveat being that you’ll want adult supervision for the inoculation process for young students so that no fingers get poked. It's an indoor project. You'll need a bag of pre-cooked rice, rubbing alcohol, and some paper bandage tape.