Evol's bulk mushroom attempt

[Ratatoskr]

Sorry for the late reply, hopefully it still does some good.

The first thing you should do is determine the wattage of your microwave oven. Then, perform a test trial, following the directions below, to determine how long the chocolate will need to be microwaved in your oven. For a 700-watt microwave, melt for 1 minute on high, and then 15-second intervals until you see where the melting point is. For 1,200-watt ovens, melt for 30 seconds, and then 15-second intervals.

1 pound Merckens or Nestle coating caps

Put coating caps in a microwave-safe dish. Bring it out and stir after one minute. Generally, it takes about 2 minutes and 30 seconds per pound for candy caps.

Always remove chocolate at each 1-minute interval, stir, and continue this process until melted.

Other tips: The less chocolate that you melt at a time, the faster it will overheat. Therefore, it is always best to melt 1 pound of chocolate at a time. It is best to use a small Corningware-type dish, and do not use Pyrex.

Personally I like using Cadbury Royal Dark. It's not gonna break the bank and it melts FAR better than Hershey. IME, Hershey chocolate (bars at least) are very poor for chocolate making. Cadbury bars are made up of little squares, each one about half the size of a rectangular block that you'd see on a hershey bar. I've found about 4 tiny squares will hide about a gram of shroom powder very nicely. Another eyeball figure is using 2 big Cadbury bars for half an ounce of shroom powder.

As a rule, large batches are way easier to work with.

The moulds I use look like really tiny cupcake pans - the cavities are about 2" in diameter, and maybe an inch deep. Probably closer to half an inch. I'd measure but they're in the freezer right now. Oh, and the pans themselves are non-stick coated and maybe 9" x 5". Small enough to fit in a toaster oven.

The only problem is that they are 6 to a sheet, so I have to measure out 12 grams instead of using a pre-measured half ounce (~14g.)

Back in the day when I first got into chocolates, a friend said "don't be a hero and go the double boiler route" and damn was he right. Nothing's worse than scorching chocolate that's seized and won't re-melt... AFTER you've put the shroom powder in. With a little luck that batch was saved. The resulting chocolates were just 1/2g doses instead, and were an almost fudge-like consistency.

Oh yeah. DON'T LICK YOUR FINGERS. Sure, I know what you're thinking. "This can't even be a quarter of a gram, I wonder what it tastes like." It's... well, it's a great idea. It does, however, make completion of the chocolate making a tad more difficult though. Just that little bit of chocolate WILL have threshold effects, and you'll have a lot less desire to finish all of a sudden.

I also recommend dedicating a separate glass bowl, rubber scraper, metal spoon, and whatever other implements you may be using for exclusive shroom chocolate use. It's damned impossible to get every last bit out of the bowl, off of the spoon and scraper etc... especially because of the dramatic increase in surface area and decrease in density. Kinda like adding boiling chips *and* salt to water when you boil it - the chocolate will set much faster with shroom powder mixed into it.

You can, however, scrape off and save these 'scraps' once they've solidified. I've found it's easiest to just include the leftover little bits in your next batch.

Overall the chocolate shroom trip is a slightly different beast than just straight eating. That ubiquitous shroom gassiness and cramping seems almost completely non-existent and the come-up is far faster than usual.

The worst (or best, perhaps) part is that it tastes exactly like chocolate. Every once in a while you'll notice a bit of a shroom after-flavor (and anyone who has trouble eating shrooms knows that taste) and the occasional bit of grittiness, but nowhere near enough to make it unpleasant to eat. It's best to nibble slowly in the hopes of easing the come-up.

Some interesting recipes from my friends MX and Pg:

One of my favorite teks for chocolate prep was actually invented by a chemist and goes against most chefs advice.

You are not suppose to add water to chocolate when melted because it will cause the emulsifier and the coco butter crystals to separate and cause seizing which is when the chocolate is grainy and gross.

To do this tek get some ice and put it in a bowl of water and place a bowl on top of it in a double boiler configuration.

Now mix water and chocolate into a pan and put over a low heat until the chocolate is melted... immediately pour the choco mix into the bowl and whisk fiercely until the chocolate become thick like butter. The constant whisking and cold causes the emulsifier and coco butter remain together but in a different configuration. The end result is chocolate but in a butter like concoction but is almost pure chocolate so it has the rich chocolate taste. Now you can mix in your cube powder and mix thoroughly and place in a container. Your mix will remain in semi solid butter like consistancy good for spreading or spooning over pot brownies.

Another tek I learned from watching the cooking channel is if you freeze melted chocolate fast enough you can solidify it without forming any choco butter crystals. The benefit of this is you will have perfectly solid chocolate but it will be flexible like taffy until it warms up so its completely bendable and can be shapped anyway you want. This is how chefs make those wicked choco sculptures on top of desserts. Ive done this before to top off cheesecakes and my famous biscotti with coffee choco mousse dipping sauce... Ill take some pictures the next time I do it.

To do this take two metal baking pans and put dry ice and iso alcohol in one pan and then put the other pan inside it double boiler configuration. Now be very careful with this.... dry ice and alcohol together will be cold enough to freeze anything solid much like liquid nitrogen so dont get it on you or touch the pans with your bare skin. Now melt chocolate in a double boiler and pour and spread into the top pan and let it sit for a few seconds. The chocolate will solidify and then you just take a spatula and separate it from the pan... Voila its completely flexible like taffy.... shape it how you want and use it to impress girls with your fancy desserts. I guess you could use this for mushroom chocolates but it could be a little overboard.

For hedonistic sclerotia lovers:

With dried sclerotia, I've found that a pre-soak in grand marnier does wonders for reconstitution, then hand blend & whip into ganache over double boiler. Spoon them out, drop into cocoa powder, then roll in diced candy ginger while still not set.

From lastlokean:

Recipe makes 40 Truffles each with 1.4 grams of booms.

Materials:
- 3 pounds Chocolate bark/chips.
- 2 oz Mushrooms (Quantity variable), desired potency.
- Heavy whipping cream
- Butter
- Toothpicks
- Wax paper
- Microwave safe bowl

*optional*
- Liquor(Everclear or some strong grain alcohol) *optional
- 2 oz or more Passion Flower leaves (or any other herb)
- Coffee filters


Directions:
1) Powder the mushrooms. Powdering greatly increases surface area and the rate/intensity of which the trip comes on.

*optional* - Recommended - Passion flower Tincture
2) Powder/Grind passion flower leaves/ends(if not already)
3) Mix alcohol and passion flower in a pan, low heat for a few hours. The liquor will turn dark black.
4) Filter the concoction, keeping the fluid and tossing the herb remains.
5) Continue to low heat the alcohol until quantity is reduced to 3-5 ounces.
6) Save the black goo, this is the Passion flower tincture, a mild MAOI, sedative and relaxing experience.
* Source erowid.org (passion flower experiences
+ info)

*Otherwise substitute tincture for plain alcohol.

7) Melt 2lb of the chocolate in microwave or double boiler. For microwave on defrost/low nuke for 1 min intervals with stirring between until evenly melted and hot(don't overdo it!)
8) Stir powdered mushrooms, and optional tincture into the melted chocolate.
9) Add 3 tablespoon heavy whipping cream, and 3 tablespoon melted butter to the chocolate mixture.

This will cause the mixture to thicken into a paste, continue mixing rapidly until a putty like consistency is achieved.
Add more butter if the mix is dry/powdery.
10) Set out a sheet of wax paper, and oil/butter its surface.
11) Weight out 24 gram portions of the paste and roll into a ball, setting on the wax paper.
12) Refrigerate or freeze the paste balls until firm.
13) Melt the rest of the chocolate in a decent size dish as in step 7.
14) With a toothpick stab each chocolate ball and dip in the melted chocolate. Setting the dipped chocolate ball back onto the wax paper.
15) Refrigerate the chocolate balls for another 20-30 minutes(until chocolate is hardened.)
16) Reward the hard work with a few tasty psychedelic truffles. - Don't forget to share

Professional finish: Melting white chocolate and drizzling over the finished truffle. Allow to harden once more.
This will cover up/fill in the toothpick holes, otherwise be creative to fill in the holes with something decorative.

For a bonus, instead of butter use cannabutter (thc infused butter)

From experience 1.4 gram dose in combination with the passion flower extract as above results in a healthy trip, while reducing tension/nervousness and nausea. Furthermore passionflower within my experiences enhances visuals and the body high, potentially due to the mild MAOI properties of the passion flower.

Recipe taken from a friend that uses the same method instead of psychedelic mushrooms uses powdered morning glory seeds. (Talk about an intense chocolate)

P.S. I do not encourage illegal activity, i.e. eating/preparing or involvement with illegal mushrooms.

Further experiments:
I found when adding powdered mush in excess quantity will make powdery or dry centers, this can be remedied by simply adding melted butter or oil, until a workable consistency is reached.
Conclusion: You can make chocolates as potent as you want (beyond 1-1 mush-chocolate) ratio.
Furthermore with a greater mushroom-chocolate ratio it is possible to get a rather decent quantity of alcohol into the mix, if you're working with everclear or bacardi 151 the chocolates can develop quite a bit of alcoholic bite.

What dung, isolation, and a lot of practice can do:

These are South American, and some of the biggest cubes I've ever seen anywhere. I have no idea who grew these, but I hope they took clones and patented their sub recipe and environmental control tek.

 

[Ratatoskr]

How are they coming along? Did you find any more recipes? I remembered or found a few more, so I figured this is a good place to share. I'm sure this won't be the only grow for folks here.

You can make tea easily enough. Anything from one dose per glass to strong enough to get an intense trip from a shotglass of liquid. You just chop up the total amount of mushrooms you're going to use and boil the total amount of water you'll need, ie: 3g per person, 4 people, 12g of fungus per dose of water. You never want to use boiling water or you'll cook off all the magic, but after you bring it to a boil and let it cool for 10-15 minutes you can pour it over the mushrooms. A french press is great for this, because you can keep them submerged until you're ready to drink. A pinch of ascorbic acid is a great addition, it'll make the magic move to the water easier. Leave it submerged for at least 30 minutes, but overnight is fine if you're supplying a few people. Just don't let them soak more than 12 hours or they could start to ferment. You can add whatever flavored tea or drink mix you want here, just know that if you used an acid that will impact the final taste. Also know that teas will hit you fast and hard. They tend to be less visual than eating whole mushrooms, but with no solds to digest the magic is immediately available to your body so it can still be a hell of a trip. You can use the basic tea and make slurpees, slushies, shakes, cocktails, instant soups, etc out of. Just remember to keep an eye on temps so you don't cook off your magic and you can really do just about anything with them.

You can also add mushroom powder to your favorite no-bake cookie recipes. Just chop well, mix more than you've ever mixed anything before (you do not want 'hot spots' when dealing with psychedelics, unless you're ready for the potential consequences), and add a known amount of powder to a known batch. For example, use 12g of powder for a no-bake recipe that makes 6 cookies for 2g magic per cookie. Adjust for your desired dose per final amount of cookies. I'd recommend making a light cookie if you try this. If you're prone to stomach cramping or mushroom gas the last thing you need is to try digesting massive amounts of peanut butter or dried fruits at the same time.

Another recipe from my friend MM:

Magic Mushroom Ganache

So a wonderful way to make magic chocolates by first making a magic ganache. This will keep all the little flecks and pieces of mushroom out of your finished confection. The magic is absorbed into the milk, using heat (and milk has lactic acid so it's already slightly acidic) I prefer a more complex flavor to my chocolate so I always combine two different types. The best flavor I found is 2 parts dark chocolate and 1 part semi-sweet chocolate.

Note: different chocolate combinations/types will require different amounts of cream to get the desired result. Changing the cream ratio will yield different consistencies which have different uses.

The key here is to make sure you DO NOT curdle the cream.

First you need:

10g's powdered mushrooms
1/2 cup (3oz) dark chocolate
1/4 cup (1.5oz) semi-sweet chocolate
1/2 cup (4oz) heavy cream (NOT ultra-pasteurized)
1 small pat of butter

1 large mixing bowl
1 small saucepan
1 whisk
1 strainer + cheese cloth
1 ice bath (bowl of ice)

Yields roughly one cup (9oz) of ganache. Equates to roughly 1.1g/oz ganache.

Directions:

1. Chop the chocolate into medium pieces. Place into a large mixing bowl, set aside.
2. Pour the cream into a small saucepan and place over medium heat.
3. When the the edges begin to bubble slightly, toss in the pat of butter and the powdered mushrooms.
4. Reduce heat to maintain the slight bubbling at the edges. Simmer for 20-30 minutes.
5. Increase heat to force a quick boil.
6. As soon as large bubbles form IMMEDIATELY remove the pan from heat.
7. Place into the ice bath for one second, to halt the cooking of the cream.
8. Hold the strainer (lined with moistened cheese cloth) over the bowl of chopped chocolate, and pour the cream over the chocolate.
9. Wring the cheesecloth (now full of mushrooms) out to make sure all of the magic cream is recovered.
10. Let the chocolate + cream sit for 5 minutes. This will cool the cream and heat the chocolate.
11. Whisk briskly until the mixture is smooth and satiny.
12. Allow to chill overnight, covered in the fridge.

You can now scoop out the ganache and roll into 1 oz pieces and cover them in chocolate. (my preferred use for this ratio)

Or whip the entire mixture into a fluffy icing for cakes, brownies, cupcakes, substitute for Cool-whip etc. This also makes it easy to pipe into all kinds of cool shapes and designs.

Or heat slightly to thin out and pour over ice cream. Or into silicone molds.

Or heat more thoroughly and vigorously whisk into a cup of milk for an amazing chocolate milk drink.

Or layer it into a cake, or parfait.

Or eat plain, as is. Very rich and tasty.

Or get creative, a lot of different dishes can be made, especially when you change the ratio around and get different ganache consistencies.

You can add more mushrooms into the mix. It would only throw off the final consistency if you don't strain out the mushrooms.

If you want to add more flavor soak flavorings or herbs in overnight in the cream.

Orange+basil+Dark chocolate = Amazing.

Use the zest of 2-3 oranges (juice can curdle cream if the pH drops too much) and 2 fresh basil leaves. soak overnight and no worries about final consistency because you will strain anyway.

 

[evol]

I harvested these today. They seem to be bigger on the second flush...

 

[Mr Piggy]

Looking good! I'm so in the mood for shrooms right now!

 

[evol]

Thanks Mr Piggy! Next up is PE! I have 4 quart size wbs jars nocced with growth beginning! It's a lot easier now that I have a heat mat and temp gauge.

 

[Ratatoskr]

So, uh... Have you pooped gold sparkles yet? :

 

[evol]

Here are my 4 wbs jars that I nocced with PE. I'm getting nice growth.

 

[GoAuto6]

Dumb question , What is WBS?

 

[evol]

Dumb question , What is WBS?

Wbs is Wild Bird Seed and PE is Penis Envy

 

[deadkndys]

Here are some harvest pics and a pic of the ones still growing. I'm very happy for this being my first try at growing shrooms.

You really shouldn't rip them out like that. When you do you leave a crater in the substrate giving contams a food hole. Instead twist the mushroom at the base until it tears from the bottom or cut off at the base with some garden pruners.