Quality & Safety Standards
Buona Foods has a careful, deliberate process for every step of mushroom production from spore to shelf. Our mushrooms are grown at Bella Farms, which are FSMA-compliant, MGAP-certified, and follow stringent food safety procedures.
Here’s how we do it.
The Growing Process
Mushroom Houses
It’s not the heat—nor the humidity. All 17 of our long buildings are equipped with powerful climate control systems to regulate temperature, humidity, and ventilation. We would keep our mushrooms cool as cucumbers, except that they’re mushrooms, not cucumbers. In any case, our buildings are layered with over 114,000 square feet of floor-to-ceiling beds, producing over three million pounds of mushrooms annually.
Compost
As everyone remembers from science class, crops need nutrient-rich soil to synthesize their energy and grow into delicious produce. With our mushrooms, the key to that healthy growth process is our carefully-made, pasteurized compost full of straw, corncobs, and, yes, manure.
Spawn
Speaking of science, you’d need a microscope to see the tiny spores or “spawn” that take four months to mature into mushrooms. Seven to 14 days after the compost is inoculated with the spawn, a network of thread-like cells called “mycelia” (yes, these terms will be on the test later) forms and eventually bears mushrooms as its fruit.
Casing
Once our mycelium develops and starts to produce, we cover the beds with a layer of casing— usually peat moss—to act as a moisture barrier. Eighteen to 21 days later, tiny mushrooms begin forming, and we can hardly contain our excitement for what comes next.
Harvest
Next, our harvest team spends three to five days handpicking each mushroom crop. We’re careful to ensure the delicate mushrooms are harvested undamaged before we move on to another crop. By staggering crops across four-month growth periods like this, we ensure both quality and sustainability.
Processing
Of course, that’s not the end of each mushrooms’ journey. We need to get them to you! But before we ship them, we put just as much care into processing and packing them as we do into growing them. This efficient process allows us to produce high volumes of fresh mushrooms for foodservice and private-label retail packaging. The process maintains the strict provision of PrimusGFS Global Food Safety certification. We’ll wash, slice, and pack your mushrooms to your specification. They’re then vacuum-cooled and can also be frozen, jarred, or dried depending on your order.
Distribution
Finally, the step you’ve been waiting for: our mushrooms becoming your mushrooms. Our crops leave our state-of-the-art processing facility on refrigerated trucks equipped with air-ride suspension, ensuring optimum freshness and less bruising. Just like that, you’re well-stocked with fresh, delicious mushrooms. And don’t worry, we were just kidding about that test earlier—but if you’re itching to learn more about the latest mycelia scuttlebutt, we’re happy to share.
