Ingredient Overview
Maitake, also called hen of the woods, forms overlapping clusters of frilled caps. It is both a culinary mushroom and a source of mushroom polysaccharides, and is now grown commercially on wood-based substrates.
Maitake bridges familiar food use and concentrated mushroom ingredients. Its broad clusters of edible caps supply the raw material for extraction, while the finished powder is easier to distribute through a blend than the intact mushroom. It can be considered for mushroom beverages and capsule formulations, with beta-glucans among its principal constituents of interest.