Maitake

What it is

Maitake (Grifola frondosa) grows as a large rosette of overlapping gray-brown fronds from a single branching base. In the wild it's called hen of the woods and appears in early fall at the base of oak trees, sometimes in the same spot year after year. The Japanese name means "dancing mushroom."

Wild maitake has look-alikes, and we don't give foraging advice. Buy it from a grower; cultivated maitake is available year-round.

Taste and cooking

Maitake is rich and earthy with a slightly peppery edge. The thin fronds crisp up while the base stays tender, so you get two textures from one mushroom.

• Roast it in big pieces. Pull the cluster into fist-size pieces, toss with oil and salt, and roast hot until the edges are dark and crisp.
• Press it in a pan. Sear a whole cluster under a heavy pan for a crisp "steak."
• Save the trimmings for stock or risotto.

Cook maitake through. It shrinks a lot, so buy more than you think you need.

How it's grown

Maitake is slower and fussier to grow than oysters or lion's mane, which is one reason fewer small farms offer it. Growers use bags or bottles of supplemented hardwood sawdust, give them a long colonization period, and then fruit them under carefully controlled humidity, temperature and light. Large indoor farms produce it year-round.

Storing it

Keep maitake in the refrigerator in a paper bag or its original container, following Penn State Extension's advice for fresh mushrooms, and cook it within a few days. Fresh maitake has firm, dry fronds and a clean, earthy smell. Wilted, slimy or dark wet edges, or a sour smell, mean it's past its best. It dries well if you have a dehydrator.

Where to buy maitake

5 growers in our directory list maitake by name@if ($ohio->isNotEmpty()), 1 of them in Ohio. Availability changes with the season and the harvest, so check with the farm before you go.

Does the science say…?

Most maitake research involves concentrated extracts, especially polysaccharides from the fruiting body, rather than the mushroom as food.

• A phase I/II trial at Memorial Sloan Kettering gave a maitake polysaccharide extract to 34 postmenopausal women who had finished breast cancer treatment. The main goal was safety. The extract was associated with measurable immune changes, but the effects were complicated: some immune measures went up and others went down, and middle doses sometimes behaved differently from high and low ones. The authors warned that "botanical agents produce more complex effects than assumed" (Deng et al., 2009).
• Memorial Sloan Kettering's integrative medicine service notes that maitake may lower blood sugar, which matters for anyone taking diabetes medication, and describes a case report of a raised INR in a patient taking the blood thinner warfarin.

Eating maitake as food is generally considered safe. Maitake extracts haven't been shown to treat cancer or any other disease. If you're thinking about supplements, talk with your care team first.