Pressure cooker for mushroom cultivation is a must-have for everyone who wants to grow mushrooms at home. Pressure cookers are among the necessary instruments for the cultivation process, regardless of your level of expertise as a mushroom farmer.
Creating mushrooms or working with substrates can be avoided with ease if you acquire a working pressure cooker. This equipment can be used for a variety of purposes, but it all begins with choosing the proper one.
In this post, we’ll explain pressure cooker for mushroom cultivation, how they operate, and how to choose the best pressure cookers for the job. Let’s first examine the value of pressure cookers, though.
Why You Need A Pressure Cooker For Mushroom Cultivation
If you want to grow mushroom at home, a pressure cooker is important equipment that will help you fight contamination. You need these pressure cookers to sterilize grain spawn, agar, grain, substrates, tools and more. Without regulation sterilization, they are prone to contamination and can eventually run down your mushroom cultivation.
When you sterilise your materials, you are creating a healthy and safe environment for your mushrooms top grow. This is because the process kills all bacteria, unwanted fungi and other dangers that pose danger to the safe cultivation of mushrooms.
Ideally, you should sterilise or cook the materials at 15 PSI to kill off all bacteria and fungi. Different growers also sterilise for varying amount of time, but it all depends on the material you’re cooking, liquid materials often take lesser time to sterilise, while tools will take longer.
Failure to grow your mushrooms in a sterile environment can expose them to mold or mildew growth and this will hamper your cultivation and productivity.
How Pressure Cooker For Mushroom Cultivation Work
Many people use pressure cookers in their kitchen for preparing various meals and they can attest to how faster and differently hot these cookers are, when compared to the regular cooking pots.
In mushroom cultivation, pressure pot plays an important role of killing unwanted bacteria and fungi and keeping the cultivation environment sterilised. If you use another cooking utensil for sterilisation, the steam might not be hot enough to kill the bacteria.
For instance, sterilizing your agar, substrates or tools in a regular pot of boiling water mean the materials will not get warmer than 100°C and this is insufficient to get rid of the contaminates and bacteria in them.
However, sterilising in a pressure cooker means there is a sustained pressure and the boiling water is able to maintain higher temperatures powerful enough to kill all the germs. A pressure pot prevents steam from escaping from and the more the pressure builds the more effective the sterilization process is.
Using pressure cooker for mushroom growing
It is vital to be able to use pressure cooker for mushroom cultivation effectively. As useful as this tool is, it could also be dangerous if wrongly used. In this article, we provide you with useful tips that will enable you to use pressure cooker safely for your cultivation process.
There are several factors that can mar the use of pressure cooker for mushroom growing which include bad selection of pressure cooker, poor maintenance culture, misuse, lack of knowledge on how it works, among others.
Understanding the specificity of the pressure cooker is also essential, the user manual or cooker instruction is there for a reason – do not neglect it. Also, make it a habit to inspect the cooker and lid before use and ensure they are rightly fitted. Using a timer is also helpful to keep track of your sterilization process. Below are some useful tips to help you use pressure cooker for mushroom cultivation effectively and without chaos;
- Inspect the pressure cooker
Again, it is a bad practice to run off with using a pressure cooker without inspecting it first, whether it is a new one or has been in use for a while. Check if the lid fits properly, look out for dents, cracks, and damage. Check if the screws are well fitted and all rubbers in good shape.
- Prepare the pressure cooker for use
Depending on the cooking duration, you should measure water in the pot before you begin. If you’re boiling for 25minutes, a 1.5 inches of water will be okay, while you need to measure higher if you’ll be cooking for a longer time.
- Seal lid after placing items for sterilisation
Without sealing the lid, there will be no enough pressure to kill the contaminates in the materials or sterilise them effectively.
- Put on high heat
Ensure you turn on the gas high enough to allow the water heat up and pressure locked in for effective cooking.
Allow the pressure pot cool off and pressure down before you attempt to open the lid. Doing otherwise can end up in a catastrophe.
