DIY Mushroom Coffee: Why and How to Make it

You may have heard a bit of buzz recently about mushroom coffee. You probably heard https://gbmushrooms.net/mushroom-coffee/ about it on a podcast, or read about it on a health and wellness website. You may even have seen it for sale locally. But what is mushroom coffee? Should you drink it? And how do you make it?

What is Mushroom Coffee?
Mushroom coffee, very simply, is ground coffee with mushroom powders added. It’s a way to add the nutritional benefits of medicinal mushrooms to your diet, combining it with a daily habit that a lot of us already have; your morning cup of coffee. Different brands of mushroom coffee will contain different mushrooms and different ratios of mushroom to coffee, and they may make a variety of health claims.

Benefits of Mushroom Coffee
There are a few benefits to drinking mushroom coffee.

Perhaps the most straightforward benefit is that it reduces the overall amount of caffeine in your morning cup. The bulk of the mushroom powders contains no caffeine, so your cup of mushroom coffee may have as much as half the amount of caffeine found in regular coffee. A cup or two of regular coffee in the morning doesn’t have enough caffeine to be a problem for most of us, but for those who are sensitive to caffeine or who are limiting their intake for other reasons, this may mean that they can enjoy their coffee in the morning worry-free!

But the primary reason for adding mushroom powders to your coffee is to get the nutritional benefits of these mushrooms! Mushrooms contain vitamins, minerals, polyphenols, carotenoids, and polysaccharides that can be beneficial to your health. The vitamins and minerals may seem pretty straightforward, but what are these other compounds?

Polyphenols and carotenoids are antioxidant compounds that are thought to promote health. Polyphenols can help reduce inflammation and support immune function. Carotenoids also can help prevent Vitamin A deficiency when included in your diet. Both of these types of compounds are only available in plant-based (or fungus-based!) foods.

Polysaccharides are the complex carbohydrates that your doctor or nutritionist wants you to eat more of! They provide food for beneficial gut flora, and those flora break down these complex carbohydrates so that you can get the nutritional benefits as well!

It’s important to note that while these medicinal mushrooms have been used by humans for centuries, often in teas, there’s very little scientific study on their effects in the human body. We don’t always know, for example, whether they’re appropriate for use by pregnant people or whether they interact with certain medications. Always consult your doctor before trying a new health supplement.