As daylight saving
ends and fall really starts to kick in, it seems like the perfect time to
introduce you to Chaga, king of the medicinal mushrooms!
Weeks ago, I mentioned
my crazy trip to Edmonton for the blender workshop with David Wolfe. The main
focus of this event was to introduce us to Cacao and Chaga and how to mix the
two in completely mind blowing drinks! Since then, I have been having lots of
fun with Chaga and I can definitely feel the benefits. It has one of the best
sources of antioxidants, a ton of important vitamins and minerals and a full assortment
of healing nutrients. Research has found a lot of health benefits from Chaga
being an anticancer, antiviral, blood sugar balancer, intestinal protector,
liver protector, immune system booster, antiallergenic and antibacterial, just
to name a few. It’s so amazing you can even use it to start a fire! Talk about
multitasking. lol
Right about now you
are probably thinking… WHAT? This is weird, it’s probably expensive, and the
usual, I’m sure it tastes gross!
Well, it’s not that
weird, it’s incredibly cheap, taste pretty amazing and is totally versatile.
Yep, I just shut down all your negative thoughts. The truth is you are not
actually eating the mushroom, although some do and you can buy a mushroom
powder and put it in everything, so yeah sorry I guess you are totally eating
it! That being said, the most common way to take in all the benefits of it is
to make a tea. That leads me to write about a bit of history.
The Chaga mushroom mostly
grows on yellow and white birch trees. It’s usually black and brown on the
outside while the inside has rich earthy tones. The ideal mushroom ready for
consumption is about 25 years old. Its growth is rare (will only grow in
0.025% of trees) which makes it very precious. Some say the Chaga is a parasite to the tree, some say it
grows in a symbiotic relationship with it. We all need each other in a way, so I
like to believe this is true.
Chaga has been consumed as a tea in Siberia for
more than 4600 years. They also used it on their skin and inhaled the smoke of
it because it’s so special you have
to use it all! There are so many stories on Chaga and they're all really
interesting and mysterious! There's even a theory claiming that Chaga mushrooms were
transported into space by meteorites and other debris falling on earth
where they attach themselves to trees and sprout to establish an ecosystem of
multicellular organisms. That’s a pretty crazy incredibly interesting
idea.
There's so much to
learn about Chaga but I wanted to pick your curiosity while keeping some
mystery for you to shape you own journey with it!
All this information
to finally say, yeah just make a tea out
of it. I find the best way to make tea is to just buy dry chunks of it and
boil it. The great thing about this is that you can reuse the mushrooms so many
times (about 30 times) unlike regular tea. Just strain the
chunks and let them dry until the next day and you are good to go again. I have
read different ways to make it but being extremely time conscious, I don’t boil
it for as long and I skip a few steps. Here is how I like it:
6 cups of water
4 Tbsp of dry Chaga Chunks
Bring the water to a
boil with the Chaga in it and let it simmer for 45 minutes (or until you can’t
wait any longer). Pour the tea out of the pot using a fine mesh strainer to
catch all the chunks. I like to just boil it in a regular pot as I find it too long to
get all the chaga out of a tea pot. I like it on its own, or with
vanilla and sugar. I also like to keep some in the fridge and make some ice tea out of
it. It’s very versatile and fun to experiment with. Here is my favorite recipe
which is also a great electrolyte for workouts or post-workouts.
Orange Chaga Electrolyte Drink
2 Cups cold Chaga tea
Juice of 1 orange
1 Tsp Agave Nectar
¼ Tsp Vanilla extract
½ Cup water
¼ Tsp Sea Salt
1 slice of Orange zest.
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