HAS THE festive season left you feeling enervated? Consume Cordyceps to perk up or reishi to feel calm. Looking to get fitter? Eat maitake for heart health or shiitake to lower your cholesterol. Do you want to be more productive in 2026? Try lion’s mane for boosted brain-power.
PREMIUM Representational image.(Freepik)
The internet is abuzz with such tips, for wellness-industry folk aver that some mushrooms really are magic. A class of fungi referred to as “adaptogenic” (meaning they help the body manage stress) and “nootropic” (they improve cognitive function) is all the rage. According to Brightfield Group, a market-research firm, mentions of lion’s mane have more than tripled on Reddit, TikTok and Instagram in the past two years. Searches for “mushroom coffee” have increased by 1,000% on Google since 2022.
Products are sprouting up to meet demand. Supermarkets stock fungi chocolates and sweets. Marks & Spencer, a British retailer, sells lion’s mane vanilla lattes and fruit juices. De Soi, a mocktail company, adds reishi to its “mood boosting”, “stress soothing” drinks. Spacegoods, a British startup, offers an “all-in-one” powder in a variety of flavours. Alice, which produces mushroom chocolate, suggests eating a cube before going to bed: “Nightcap” to promote better sleep or “Happy Ending” to pique sexual interest.
Such products particularly appeal to health-conscious youngsters. According to McKinsey, a consultancy, they are most eager to try edibles that promise to boost energy, gut health or immunity. But as such products are labelled as food, there is little regulation of their supposedly medicinal compounds. And scientific research offers a more down-to-earth view of these mushrooms’ benefits, says Nicholas Money, a professor at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. There is no clinical evidence that mushroom drinks have their advertised effects on humans, he argues.
Chemical extracts from lion’s mane, for instance, have been shown to spur the growth of isolated nerve cells in Petri dishes as well as to aid healing in the nervous systems of mice. That suggests possible benefits, but stops well short of proving any effect on mental acuity in humans. Professor Money is also sceptical because of what he sees as a lack of research funding in this area. “If there was any evidence that they had this effect, pharmaceutical companies would be throwing serious money at them,” he says.
Such mushrooms, then, may be best enjoyed on a plate rather than in your morning brew. (However you consume them, it is inadvisable to forage for them yourself, lest you mistake a poisonous variety for a supposedly curative one.) Shiitake is a tasty ingredient in Asian soups or stews. Lion’s mane has meaty flesh, a lobster-like taste and is delicious sautéed. Think of them as food for the soul.
News / health / Spore of the moment: mushrooms are the latest wellness-food trend
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