A mushrooming trend: how fungi became an It food

The mushroom moment of the past few years shows no sign of ending. What’s feeding its enduring popularity?

You can’t walk more than a few aisles in the grocery store these days without running into some kind of new mushroom product. Fresh white button mushrooms are increasingly joined by specialty varieties like lion’s mane, maitake or oyster mushrooms. There’s sparkling cordyceps tea and chaga coffee boasting a range of health benefits, mushroom chips and even chocolate bars infused with reishi.

Mushrooms have been steadily growing in popularity in the US over the last decade, said Eric Davis, a representative of the Mushroom Council. Mushrooms frequently top food trends lists and were even named “ingredient of the year” in 2022 by the New York Times. According to the consumer consultancy Circana, grocery store sales of fresh mushrooms have increased by 20% over the past decade, while sales of specialty mushrooms have doubled in the same timeframe.

“A few years ago, we were saying ‘mushrooms are definitely having a moment right now, let’s enjoy it.’ Here we are three or four years later, and it’s still happening,” Davis said.

So what’s behind the craze that’s allowed mushrooms to sustain such momentum?

Meet the mushroompreneurs

As co-founder of Smallhold, the best-known provider of specialty mushrooms in the US, Andrew Carter has had a front-row seat to this mushroom moment. Though Smallhold has been growing varieties like blue oyster and lion’s mane in indoor farms since 2017, the company’s founders witnessed an inflection point during the lockdowns in 2020, when they went from selling their produce to restaurants in Brooklyn to selling direct to consumer…

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