What type of Mushrooms are grown in the UK

Mushrooms are a type of fungus that is grown in various places such as logs, compost, hay, corn cobs, sawdust, straw, and animal manure. With over 50,000 species of mushrooms across the globe, it is almost impossible to identify them all.

There are around 15,000 species of mushroom variations growing in the United Kingdom. The Agaricus Bisporus, also known as white mushroom, represents more than 95% of all the mushrooms that are either consumed or grown in the UK, with Shiitake, Maitake and Oyster mushrooms among the top species of edible mushrooms that come next in the preferences of UK producers/consumers.

Here is the list of the most common type of mushrooms grown in the United Kingdom (UK):

1. White mushroom, or Agaricus Bisporus. This is the most common cultivated mushroom in the United Kingdom, and represents almost the entirety of the mushroom market in the region. It is known by a diversity of other names, generally related with its three phases of development. When it is in the immature phase (closed/not fully developed), it is known as white, cultivated or button mushroom, if its colour is white, or brown, cremini/crimini or chestnut if its colour is brown. In the flat/open developing stage, the agaricus will generally be brown, the cap will have around 5-10 cm and be open with spores in the bottom part. In the full mature phase, it the cap can have 10-15 cm and is wide open in the bottom, being commonly refereed to as portobello/portabella mushroom.

• Uses/ Benefits – this type of mushroom is believed to fight physical and emotional stress, stimulate the immune system, improve the quality of life in diabetics, have the ability to reduce cholesterol levels,  and peptic ulcer, treat circulatory and digestive problems and fight cancer 
• Characteristics – this type of mushroom has a short visible stem with short-gills, usually pinkish to pink at an early stage, becoming dark brown to nearly black. The color ranges from white, often bruising reddish to brownish; with a thin ring that sometimes disappears in maturity.
• Where do they grow – Agaricus mushrooms grow on compost, straw-bedded horse manure, and hay or wheat straw are the most used substrate to cultivate them.
• When do they grow – This mushroom is commonly found worldwide in fields and grassy areas following rain, from late spring to autumn.

There is also a fringe market for exotic mushroom types in the UK, the most frequent types being:

2. Shiitake Mushroom (Golden Oak Mushroom) Lentinula edodes

• Uses/ Benefits: have a medicinal quality and has a rich flavorful taste used by gourmet chefs
• Characteristics – The diameter of a shiitake mushroom is around 10-20 cm, with an umbrella-shaped cap, and has a color ranging from light to dark brown. It has a thin stem and fleshy and spongy cream color
• Where do they grow- shiitake is a type of mushroom that only grows on a wood-based medium, it is best to grow shiitake on logs, it can also be grown using blocks of sawdust that can be easily bought in the market. Although they grow at high temperatures, shiitake mushrooms prefer cold weather, though they grow at high temperatures, the ideal temperature to grow them faster is 7-21 degrees Celsius.
• When do they grow- after inoculation, shiitake mushrooms should appear between 6-12 months,

3. Maitake mushrooms ( Hen of the Woods) Grifola frondosa

• Uses/ Benefits: maitake contains chemicals that can help fight tumors and stimulate the immune system. Young maitake is tender and can be eaten raw.
• Characteristics- maitake grows in clusters, has a color of grayish brown, has no gills, and has a fan-shahped cap mushroom that grows 2 to 7 cm in diameter. It has a good smell at first, but when fully mature it develops an unpleasant aroma.
• Where do they grow- the ideal environment to grow maitake mushrooms should have a shady place but not too dark with a cool temperature of 13-18 degrees Celsius and 80-90% relative humidity. Just like shiitake, it is best to grow in logs.
• When do they grow- in the wild maitake grows in early autumn all the way into late November. It grows slowly compared to other mushroom species.

4. Oyster mushroom, Pleurotus ostreatus

• Uses/ Benefits – Oyster mushroom is very beneficial, it contains antioxidants and has the ability to slower the spread of a cancer and can lower cholesterol levels, furthermore, it is use in Bioremediation uses micro-organisms to reduce pollution through the biological degradation of pollutants into non-toxic substances. This can involve either aerobic or anaerobic micro-organisms that often use this breakdown as an energy source.
• Characteristics – Oyster mushrooms has a several color variations like grey or greyish-brown, yellow or golden yellow and pink and it has an oyster-shaped cap and the usual size is 5- 25 cm across, they have a very short stem. The caps does not have scales and smooth in texture. The flesh of oyster mushroom is firm and white.
• Where do they grow – Oyster mushroom mycelium isn’t picky they grow in form of clusters called shelves on rotting or fallen logs of hardwood trees such as aspen oak and beech trees.
• When do they grow – The growing season of oyster mushroom is fall but it is available all year round because it isn’t difficult to cultivate.

5. Enokitake, Golden needle mushroom, Flammulina velutipes

• Uses/ Benefits – Enokitake is widely known for its medicinal value for treating high blood pressure, high cholesterol, liver disease, and stomach ailments, it is rich in vitamins, minerals, and healthy amino acids, they are low in cholesterol, high in dietary fiber, and full of antioxidants. It has a mild and fruity flavor.
• Characteristics – Cultivated Enokitake mushrooms grows very small in size and grows in bunch of tightly packed long white stems with a tender, smooth, delicate white convex shaped caps connected together. Enokitake grows twelve centimeters in length. Wild Enoki mushrooms have larger caps, shorter stems, color ranges from orange to brown, it has a slightly sticky, rubbery fruiting body and are velvety in consistency, with a more earthier flavor.
• Where do they grow – the spawn of cultivated enoki should have an environment that has a 90-100% humidity and an increased amount of CO2, the ideal temperature is about 72-77° Fahrenheit or 22-25° Celsius. The most common used substrate is aged hardwood sawdust.  In the wild they can be found growing on a Chinese hackberry tree stumps  and on other trees, such as ash, mulberry and persimmon trees.
• When do they grow – they are available year-round but grows naturally in winter season (September- March).

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6. Lion’s mane mushroom, Hedgehog mushroom, Bearded tooth mushroom, Hericium Erinaceus

• Uses/ Benefits – Research has found that lion’s mane has valuable medicinal properties, chemicals from lion’s mane can protect a person against dementia, reduce mild symptoms of anxiety and depression and help repair nerve damage. It is also used widely by gourmet chefs because of its delectable sweet taste, and a meaty crab-like flavor fruiting body.
• Characteristics – A lion’s mane mushroom fruiting bodies are white, grows from medium-sized ( 8 cm) to large (40 cm) or about 3-16 inches in diameter. It consists of a soft, long, and slightly bendable white spine that grows 1-6cm in length and a body with a spherical or icicle-like shape. The fruiting body of a lion’s mane mushroom is tender while young.
• Where do they grow – They can be grown in sawdust or on hardwood logs such as oak, maple, and birch. The ideal environment temperature of a lion’s mane to fruit should stick around 65°-75° Celsius when using sawdust it should also have indirect light and some air movement. For logs that have a moisture content of 40%, and has a shady area with enough air circulation.
• When do they grow – They grow any time of the year but spring is best. If being cultivated it will grow  6 months after log inoculation.

7. Cauliflower mushroom, White fungus Sparassis crispa

• Uses/ Benefits – this type of mushroom is one of the rare delicacies known to be used by gourmet chefs because of the neutral, earthy, and subtly nutty flavor. It has a variety of medical benefits and has been discovered to have anti-microbial, anti-fungal, and anti-tumor features. 
• Characteristics – Cauliflower mushroom has a unique shape and appearance that is similar to the head of a cauliflower, it has a cap-less fungus, it grows on clusters of frilled leaf looking branches and the diameter ranges from 7 to 20 inches wide. The color variations of cauliflower mushrooms are from white to light tan and or white and pale grey.
• Where do they grow – this type of mushroom is very rare and can be found usually on decaying trees and roots, they grow under conifers and hardwood tree. If cultivated, 70 ~ 100% saturated humidity at 15 ~ 20 ℃ temperature is the required environment and they grow on sawdust of an oak tree, alder, cottonwoods, and elms.
• When do they grow – cauliflower mushrooms usually grow from July until October or the Autumn season.

If you are interested in understanding more about the most frequent types of mushrooms more commonly known, edible or not, have a look at our post on this topic, available here.

Market Value of Mushrooms in the United Kingdom 

Based on the latest available data from the Food and Agriculture Organisation, as of 2019 the UK was the 10th largest world producer of edible mushrooms, and among the largest consumers of mushrooms globally. Despite being among the top producers, and having around 300 commercial growers (mostly small and medium, family owned businesses, with just a few large players), mushrooms grown in the UK represent only about 45% of the the country’s total consumption of mushrooms.

The production of mushrooms in the United Kingdom grew steadily between 2010 and 2015, at an annual rate of around 8.3% per year. However, since that date, mushrooms production has somewhat stagnated. In 2019, around 101 kilo-tonnes of mushrooms were harvested in the territory of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, which is still below the region’s peak production level achieved in 2015.

It is therefore not surprising that the value from mushrooms production in the UK has been slightly decreasing since 2015 – about 5% drop in total, from 288 million USD in 2015 to to 275 million USD in 2018.

As I mentioned above, the UK only produces about 45% of the mushrooms that are consumed in the region. Total consumption in Great Britain and Northern Ireland in 2019 was about 217 thousand tonnes. As it only produced 101.3 thousand tonnes – and exported a marginal value of 4.6 thousand tonnes – the UK imported approximately 120.5 thousand tonnes of mushrooms in 2019. Poland, the Netherlands and the Republic of Ireland are the major providers for the mushrooms imported by the UK.

Retail value of mushrooms in the UK

The market value of all the mushrooms sold in the UK in 2018 was around 425 million GBP, a figure that has been steadily increasing since 2014. This shows that mushrooms are increasingly a popular and favoured product among UK consumers.

It is also interesting to look at the type of mushrooms that consumers buy in the UK. Here, it is clear that consumers vastly prefer the Agaricus Bisporus, which accounts for almost the entirety of the fresh mushrooms sold in supermarkets in the UK in terms of monetary value. Of these, the button and chestnut mushrooms are the most sought after, with variations such as flat and open or organic versions coming at the bottom of the preference scale.

The UK is also an important market for dried mushrooms, and in 2019 it imported about 1.3 kilo-tonnes of dried mushrooms, with a retail value above 10 million GBP. Netherlands, China, France and Italy are the main sources of dried mushrooms imports for the UK.

Impacts of Covid19 and Brexit

Covid19 appears to have not had any detrimental impact to the UK mushroom market in 2020. On the contrary, according to Fresh Plaza, mushroom sales increased in April when the country set precautionary measures on the Covid-19 pandemic by around 30%. As the situation evolved during the year and different lockdowns were set, sales started to be negatively affected – especially in the case of sales to restaurants – but they managed to remain strong over the year, and ended 2020 approximately 15% up in relation to the previous year.

At this stage it is unclear what is the impact of brexit in the mushroom market in the UK. Initial statistics point to a reduction of 40% in trade between the UK and the European Union in the first two months of 2021, though there is no public available data about the mushroom market as yet. Mushroom growers in the UK have been very concerned over the last years about the potential impact of brexit in particular in relation to having access to labour, as the industry relies heavily in labour from other European countries. Another concern was the potential introduction of tariffs if a free trade agreement would not be achieved. While this was avoided in December 2020, recent there is increased bureaucracy which is causing evident disruption to trade between the two parties

Future of the mushroom industry in the UK

Despite the concerns with brexit, the industry in the UK is currently at an exciting point and presents good opportunities for growth and investment. Assuming that labour supply issues can be resolved, there are many positive signals for the sector.

The fact that only 45% of the market is sourced by UK growers means that there is significant margin for the industry growing in the country. There is also a positive push for the industry generally around the world, driven by the emphasis on environmental concerns and ethical consumption, the seek for healthier living and food habits, the fact that mushrooms are seen as a good substitute for meat due to its consistency and flavour, or the health benefits associated with mushrooms (see our post here on this topic).

All these forces are contributing to an increase in the demand of mushrooms, and are thus positive for the future growth of the mushroom industry. Next to tomatoes, mushroom is the most important vegetable being consumed in the country, and the future of the sector looks bright over the coming years.

If you are looking for more information about the UK market, we advise you to contact the UK Mushroom Growers Association, which was established in 2019 by the leading mushroom growers from UK and Northern Ireland with the aim to support the development of the industry.

Some mushroom growers in the United Kingdom

•  Ann Miller’s Speciality Mushrooms Ltd
• Bungalow Farm Mushrooms
• Fiddleford Mushrooms Ltd
• Layer Mills Ltd
• Monaghan Mushrooms Ltd
• Moss Mushrooms
• Mushroom Castle
• Oakfield Farm Products Ltd
• P Gribbin
• Tas Valley Mushrooms
• Thornton Meadow Mushrooms Ltd
• Woodlands Mushroom Farm