# Chaga mushroom tincture recipe!



## Earthen_Step (Oct 12, 2014)

*If you want to see pictures along with the write-up go to:*
http://earthenstep.blogspot.com/2014/10/the-incredible-chaga-mushroom.html

The incredible Chaga mushroom!

I was lucky to find some Chaga growing wild on a hike I took with my kids a couple weeks ago.  I took pictures to share with you guys the harvest, processing, drying, making a tincture and tea.  I will share with you what information I know and hopefully this will help you out if you are interested.  This is one of the more powerful medicinal mushrooms available.  I would recommend all of you to look into this yourself and possibly add it to your diet. 

The Chaga (inonotus obliquus) is a very unique parasitic mushroom.  Most mushrooms eat up and grow on trees that have fallen to their death.  The Chaga is a very slow growth on a living birch tree for 10-20 years -- this makes the mushroom not very sustainable for mass consumption.  Chaga ends up killing it's host and will then spread it's spores to land and grow on open wounds of new birch tree victims.  I may attempt to inoculate some live birch trees with Chaga spores at some point,  I have no idea how successful this would be.

There are both water- and alcohol-soluble components to the Chaga mushroom.  To get a full spectrum tincture you will need to use both alcohol and water.  I will show you the process below.  Most people just make a water-based broth or tea for their Chaga, which is still a powerful medicinal drink.  If you do not do an alcohol extraction you would be missing betulinic acid (anticancer agent -- pdf with more details).  From hot water extraction you would still have a powerful antioxidant from high levels of melanin.  There are other components as well for both water and alcohol extraction.

Now for the fun part!

Harvesting your own Chaga​
Here is a piece of Chaga I could not reach, but it looks like someone else cut into it.  It also is covered in delicious spider webs  -- this might be a very health-conscious arachnid!

These next few pictures are a freshly opened up Chaga mushroom.  It will be very hard and crusty on the outside and the inside is similar to cork.  I used a pocket knife to dig out the growth, but a hatchet would be handy to get it done quicker.  On the inside it will be a golden brown with some white veins running through it.

If you are working with fresh Chaga you can cut the bits up  -- if you let it sit too long they will be as hard as a softer wood.  I cut anything that looked bad out and threw it away.  Some people will put the Chaga in a cloth bag and take a hammer to break it up some.  I just cut it with my pocket knife and sawed some bits up.  I set it out to sun dry, but that was not drying it very well because of humidity. 

I let our food dehydrator finish the job.  It only took about 5 hours to finish drying it out.  I did this with all of the parts I was not going to use asap.  If you are going to brew tea with it right when you get home, no need to dry it out. If you let it sit around it can grow mold if it is not dry!  At this point I put the fine ground bits in a jar to put in a dark cool place, and the bigger chunks in a zip bag for the same treatment.  The finer bits I did food process to make it a finer powder.  The powder will later be used to put into tea bags for tea whenever we desire.

Making Chaga tincture​
I made a tincture with  the medium-sized chunks that were nice and fresh.  Ideally you would want to use a higher alcohol content drink than vodka.  I would use everclear, but the fine state of New Hampshire "live free or die", will not sell it to me -- they don't trust my judgment enough to be that free.  If you can I recommend 90% or above alcohol.

There are 3 main ways you could go about making your tincture.

-Cold extract:  To do this all you need to do is pour your alcohol into the bottle with your Chaga and shake it 4+ times a week.  Store it in a dark cool place to keep potency high.  1 month minimum and I would do 3 months maximum till you filter out the Chaga chunks.

-Hot extract:  Cook the Chaga and alcohol mixture for 3-6 hours over a low to medium heat.  Be careful when cooking alcohol, it is flammable!  A safe way to do this is put it in a jar, and put that jar in a pot with water.  You can put the cap over the top very loose or leave it off.  If you leave it off you will have a higher concentrate from evaporation.

-Low heat extract:  This is what I did.  I cooked it under a low heat for 45 minutes then took it off the stove.  I did this once a day for 3 days.

Steps: 

1:  Fill the bottle to 2 inches or so above your Chaga.

2:  Shake your mixture (with the lid on!).  Cook the mixture for 30-45 minutes under a low heat.

3:  Take the mix off the heat and let it sit.  Once it cools down to room temp put the lid on and store till the next day.

*** Repeat steps 1-3 two more times for a total of 3 days. ***

4:  Separate the Chaga chunks from your divine liquids.  Use whatever you have available, coffee filters, strainers, cheesecloth. 

Now begin your water extraction.  If you are using a very high content alcohol this part is important for a full spectrum tincture.  If you used a 40% alcohol it is less important, since 60% of the liquid was water you have already done this.  I made a potent water extract anyways to mix in with my first alcohol batch.

Look at the pictures above for examples, but you can do the exact same thing.  Use the same Chaga you used for the alcohol extract.

1:  Fill the bottle to 2 inches or so above your Chaga.  You can fill it to the top with the water and evaporate the excess out.

2:  Shake your mixture (with the lid on!).  Cook the mixture for 30-45 minutes under a low heat.

3:  Take the mix off the heat and let it sit.  Once it cools down to room temp put the lid on and store till the next day.

Repeat steps 1-3 two more times for a total of 3 days.

4:  The only extra step.  Evaporate out the liquid until it is about the same level as your alcohol extract.  You can do this by cooking it under a low heat, or letting it sit with the lid off -- a screen over the top can keep bugs and such out.

5:  Separate the Chaga chunks from your divine liquids.  Use whatever you have available, coffee filters, strainers, cheesecloth. 

The next picture is before evaporation, but the Chaga was taken out.  Alcohol extract on the left and water extract on the right.

The final step is combining the alcohol and water extracts!  If you don't plan on using it very fast, keep the bulk of it in the freezer.  If you plan on using it within a couple months just keep it in the fridge.  I will keep half in the freezer and half in the fridge.  This made over 200 servings @ 1 teaspoon per serving.  The weaker 3rd water extract will be about 1-2 tablespoons per serving, and I will not evaporate it down.

I hope you enjoyed the write-up.  It is very strong in scent and taste at this high of concentration.  I don't mind it just put directly into my mouth and swishing it around.  If you dislike the flavor add it to a drink you like.  Fruit juice, coffee, tea, soup, whatever to help you get it in your body!

You can use the spent Chaga bits as tinder to start fires.

Have a great weekend everyone.


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## Susie (Oct 12, 2014)

Sorry, apparently unable to read this morning!


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## goji_fries (Nov 12, 2014)

I saw chaga on ebay a few months ago. Man it is a hit right now.


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