Nutrition from mushrooms, understanding and reconciling available data

Abstract

Mushrooms are nutritionally valuable foods. They are high in proteins, including most essential amino acids and high in most water soluble vitamins and probably in pro-vitamin D. However, there have been many reports suggesting that they had little or no value. While the reports of little value were erroneous, other reports have claimed greater nutritional value than can be substantiated, Moreover, most of our knowledge of the nutritional value of mushrooms is based on chemical analysis. Some of the nutrients may be destroyed or unavailable to consumers. This paper looks at the available information and tries to reconcile it.