- Mushrooms can be a form of local beauty and there's a growing fan club of people who want to learn as much as possible about their healing properties, how they taste and how they're grown.

So producer Teresa Litschke journeyed to Mills River and met with a renowned mushroom expert at Deep Woods Mushrooms.

♪ Deep Woods Mushrooms.

♪ - Yeah, that's my shaggy stock bolete.

In nature, they grow about this high.

But if you ever eat one, you might build a 28 foot tall statue to one as well because they are delicious.

The stem has the texture of asparagus and a lemony kick that will knock your socks off.

- It's safe to say Greg likes mushrooms.

- They're fascinating.

Mushrooms like people are weird, kind of like me.

- His interest has earned him many titles like the Mushroom Man and the Fun Guy.

- Or I would like to be called Johnny Mushroom Spore because I'm the local enthusiast sharing my knowledge of mushrooms so you can be a Johnny Mushroom Spore too.

- He's quick to dispel any myths about mushrooms.

- People think that mushrooms are grown in manure in the caves in Pennsylvania.

(buzzer) - And whether or not you should eat them raw.

- All mushrooms should be cooked.

They contain a gas not unlike rocket fuel in various levels that need to be cooked off.

- But when cooked, Greg believes mushrooms are hard to beat.

- They're the superfood.

They're full of proteins and have amino acids and they're just a healthy, healthy food product.

And I believe everybody should have a rick logs in their backyard to grow some of the healthiest foods right there.

- He sure does.

It's his business.

Deep Woods Mushrooms featuring foraged and cultivated mushrooms grown in wood.

The latter is for mushroom logs, a process that's been around for centuries.

A hole is drilled into a log.

Mushroom spawn is inoculated into the hole and plugged with wax.

Eight months to one year later, mushrooms start popping out all over.

Greg was introduced to the concept back in 1999.

- And it kind of mushroomed into a business.

(laughs) Pun intended.

- Greg sells his cultivated and wild mushrooms at local farmers markets like Oyster, Turkey Tail, Chaga, Reishi and Shiitake.

- Shiitake is by far my largest crop.

It's not easy, but it's the easiest of log grown mushrooms to grow.

And knowing where your mushrooms come from is very important.

- Which is why Deep Woods Mushrooms also sells the kits and spawn for you to grow your own.

- And it includes the drill bit, the wax, the instructions, the tags, everything you need except the log to grow log grown Shiitake mushrooms.

- Plus, Greg offers classes about inoculating logs as well as farm tours.

- And I show people which ones are easiest to grow versus ones you want to hunt.

The mushroom hunt classes, I teach people the ones in our area that grow abundantly, that have few lookalikes.

And that's your starting point to get involved in foraging.

- Very interesting.

Super cool.

We've done it some other places and we wanted to kind of kind of learn more about them.

- Customers especially enjoy hearing about mushrooms' medicinal benefits.

- Drank Chaga for three days and all their shingles symptoms subsided.

- Really?

- I think a lot of what we like about it is the natural healing part of it.

You know, so we're pleased to learn about it.

- I have been visited by numerous oncologists who know the value of mushroom.

- And it's that value for all things mushroom.

This fun guy hopes to offer each of his guests no matter their age.

- So from from four year old to 80 years old, it's a good knowledge base.

- He's just been very good about showing us the different types of mushrooms, a lot of the different uses, already learned some stuff that I didn't know.

- And I tell people you're going to get the world of mushrooms, according to me, a 20 year grower and forager.

And I'm not selling commercially, so I'm sharing my knowledge.

So hopefully you can understand and do it yourself.

♪ - You can find Deep Woods Mushrooms at 70 Deep Woods Road in Mills River, and they're open every day except Sunday.

To learn more, give them a call at 828-243-3589 or go online to deepwoodsmushrooms.net.