Cold rain couldn’t stop a busload of Illinois Farm Bureau members from experiencing urban agriculture at the Taste of Illinois on Location tour at IFB’s Annual Meeting in Chicago.
This year’s urban agriculture experience included three stops: Windy City Mushroom, Green Era Chicago and Wild Blossom Meadery and Winery. Each visit provided a different perspective on producing in the city and the opportunities for collaboration with rural producers in ensuring food security.
As participants stepped off the bus at the first stop at a building resembling a warehouse, it was a pleasant surprise to walk inside to the familiar sight of an auger.
“We think there’s a huge problem in our food system that we need to be providing people with real food, not synthetic, hybrid, processed or adulterated food,” John Staniszewski, co-owner, head of sales and mycologist for Windy City Mushroom, told FarmWeek. “Being able to offer this up to the community at a low, affordable cost is really what we’re trying to accomplish here.”
Windy City Mushroom was founded at the start of the COVID pandemic due to a shortage of healthy food options, including mushrooms, in the city.
The operation grows three main types of mushrooms: oyster, maitake and lion’s mane, and is planning on expanding the facility. Because mushrooms differ from traditional crops, the company has relied on innovation and experimentation to develop their growing process.
The process includes inoculating a brick of soy-hull and hardwood dust with the different fungi spores and letting the spores incubate and consume the biomass, before moving them into converted shipping containers serving as climate-controlled grow rooms.
Staniszewski said using soy-hull as a substrate presents the opportunity for collaboration.
“There’s a lot of possibilities for more sustainable farming and regenerative farming and I think there’s a big synergy between us because a lot of our substrate can go to their farms and allow their soil to be healthier,” he said.
Staniszewski said the operation can also use pelletized soy-hull for the growing process.
As members stepped off the bus for the second stop of the tour, they were greeted by a mosaic mural on the side of a Metra overpass bridge depicting the cultural significance of local food.
The Green Era Campus is a multi-million-dollar project transforming a 9-acre brownstone by restoring contaminated soil and using an anaerobic digester that processes urban food waste to create renewable natural gas. The anaerobic digester and commercial compost building is estimated to divert 42,500 tons of carbon dioxide.
The campus grows more than 125 varieties of culturally relevant fruits, vegetables, herbs and plants at the greenhouse and urban farm. Once expanded, the campus will increase food accessibility for 2,000 people per year at the retail store and nursery and will provide 500 people per year with educational and life-enriching opportunities in the Community Education Center.
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Photo Credit: gettyimages-skyf
Categories: Illinois, Rural Lifestyle