Tag Archives: dual extract

Get 20% off our mushroom dual extracts throughout September!

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Celebrate the enduring power of mushrooms with 20% off your mushroom extract purchases throughout the month of September! Mushrooms have been used for centuries for better health & well being. As one of the planet’s oldest living things, mushrooms have evolved over eons of time and every imaginable condition to produce unique fungal compounds.

Tap into the wisdom of the ages with Half Hill Farm’s Turkey Tail, Lion’s Mane, Chaga, Red Reishi, Cordyceps, and Five Blend mushroom dual extracts. Our mushroom dual extracts come in 3.38oz and 6.76oz glass bottles. We only use fully mature organic and responsibly wildcrafted mushrooms for a quality our customers have come to love for a decade.

Take 20% off your purchase of our mushroom dual extracts using coupon code MUSHROOM20 at checkout. Offer valid September 1 – September 30, 2023.

All orders over $150 get automatic free USPS Priority shipping. All orders ship within 24 hours except weekends and holidays. We are forever grateful and humbled by your love and support over the past ten years. If you’ve purchased our mushroom dual extracts before, click here to leave a review on Google. Thank you!

Lion’s Mane mushroom extract improves brain cell growth

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A new study in the January 2023 Journal of Neurochemistry shows unique compounds in Lion’s Mane mushroom extract boost memory by boosting nerve growth.

The study identified two bioactive compounds, N-de phenylethyl isohericerin and Hericene A, that appear to regulate the growth of neurons that improve memory.

The extracts had a “clear neurotrophic effect,” they write, resulting in doubly long axons – the threadlike links that conduct impulses away from a neuron – and more than triple the number of neurites, or small projections from a neuron that can grow into fully functional axons or dendrites.

“Laboratory tests measured the neurotrophic effects of compounds isolated from Hericium erinaceus on cultured brain cells, and surprisingly we found that the active compounds promote neuron projections, extending and connecting to other neurons,” Meunier says.

Researchers describe the compounds present in Lion’s Mane mushrooms as potent memory enhancers that may provide hope for natural memory enhancement for an aging population. Read more from University of Queensland researchers.

Half Hill Farm: Celebrating 10 years!

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Christian and Vince (2013) – photo by BrassPenny Photography

10th ANNIVERSARY: All year we are reflecting on ten years of big dreams and big change at Half Hill Farm. A lot can happen in ten years, but one thing is true: life has a way of showing you the path forward in every challenge if your heart and mind are open to it.

We moved to Woodbury from Murfreesboro to build and open Short Mountain Distillery for the Kaufman brothers after helping change county law in 2010 by referendum to allow it. I had just quit my job producing evening news for a local television station in search of something with more meaning and purpose and found way more than I could have imagined.

It took 16 months to build the distillery but not nearly that long to be inspired enough by the community and country living to want to slightly change direction again to start our own farm.

It almost didn’t happen. We looked for months when we saw a “for sale by owner” sign on what appeared to be a heavily wooded property. When we drove up the first part of the driveway, we stopped and looked at each other and said we should leave before seeing anything more. Something about the entrance kept us away for months until we saw a listing that showed what we had missed. Luckily, it was still on the market, and we bought it!

When we moved to our new farm in 2012, a good friend opened our eyes to nature’s possibilities with a surprise find of a giant 9 lbs Maitake mushroom growing at the base of an old oak tree. It moved us toward growing mushrooms, but not nearly as seriously as life had in store.

We started our farm with selling our organic vegetables at our local farmers market, but everything changed when Vince’s mother was diagnosed with stage four lung cancer. The farming side waned as we focused more on mushrooms and what they could do for her.

While her quality of life was dramatically improved, stage four eventually proved too difficult a challenge for Sandy. Her passing was hard, and we almost decided to stop farming when friends who needed our mushroom extracts encouraged us to keep going.

Over time, the word-of-mouth growth in demand for the mushroom extracts we made required us to move to a larger commercial kitchen we invited another new business to share. Very soon after, our new gut healthy beverage took off and we brought on a partner to get bigger space that has grown us into three retail stores.

Despite the growth, we are still based in our small hometown of Woodbury, TN. We are here because of help from a lot of friends and neighbors who believe in our vision. We still make our mushroom extracts with all organic ingredients and a monkish reverence in service to customers who need it. Because of stories of healing and personal transformation from our customers, we personally take the products every single day and will for life.

In the past ten years, we have gone from making our liquid mushroom dual extracts because no one else was to seeing a whole industry grow around what these mushrooms can do for people. We see what some get wrong and what some get right. We see companies making the most of it and companies with the same level of passion for better health & well being.

It’s exciting to see customers’ mushroom consciousness grow no matter how it happens. However you come to use mushrooms in your life, know that the roots of our dedication to better health & well being with mushrooms runs deep and is personal. Thank you for continuing to trust what we do and for choosing our farm’s products!

Shop our mushroom extracts and other products online, or visit our retail stores:

Half Hill Farm’s Mushroom Dual Extracts – new packaging, same quality and care!

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MUSHROOM EXTRACTS: When we created our farm’s popular mushroom dual extracts several years ago, we started by sparing no expense on quality because we created it for a very special member of our family battling cancer. Today, that same focus on quality and care is the reason we’ve grown into what we are today, and we will never forget that!

In a couple weeks, you’ll start seeing our new mushroom extracts packaging that will help customers see and pour the product better. It’s the exact same product made by the same people you love and trust with all the same high quality ingredients our friends and loved ones deserve.

Thank you for trusting us to help keep you on the path to better health and well being!

Purchase Half Hill Farm’s Mushroom Dual Extracts online and save 15% when you buy 4 or more 200ml bottles in any combination using coupon code “4pack.” Save 10% anytime with the one time use code “intro10.”

Read more on Half Hill Farm’s mushroom dual extracts:

Please consult your doctor if taking any of our products for health reasons. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.

‘You saved my daughter’s life!’ – the healing power of mushrooms

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A ‘cloud’ of Turkey Tail mushrooms (Trametes Versicolor) on logs at Half Hill Farm

A few months ago, I got a call from a customer who was looking for what I thought was an adjunct therapy for his daughter in treatment for brain cancer. His own research made him hopeful that our Turkey Tail extract could help. It wasn’t until a couple months later that I discovered on a second call the full extent of what was going on.

“I want you to know you saved my daughter’s life,” the customer told me. It’s something I hear often from customers, from ecstatic calls of people now in remission to those experiencing little to no side effects to chemo or radiation (most common) and positive changes in blood tests, but when he told me his daughter had been in hospice, I was shocked.

It is certainly not a common experience for patients to go from hospice back to treatment options, but it’s stories like this that give what we do meaning and purpose. It’s stories like this that are why we have grown into an FDA-registered manufacturing space and why we continue to expand our product offerings to include nature’s very best organically grown and wildcrafted mushroom extracts.

We are humbled every day with your phone calls and emails. While the body of research on mushrooms is growing, we know we cannot market our extracts or products as a treatment, cure or prevention of any disease, but that doesn’t stop our customers from sharing their stories. It has presented a unique challenge over the past two years as to how we present those stories to you in a responsible way.

Mushroom Dual Extracts available in 100 ml (3.38 oz) or 200 ml (6.76 oz) bottles from Half Hill Farm:

If you are one of the hundreds of customers across the country who take our extracts, we would love to hear why you take them and what you are experiencing. Your experience could help someone follow you on a path toward better health and well-being. You can leave your comment here, or leave a review on the product pages of our online store.

Red Reishi extract reverses obesity by altering gut bacteria

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A new study of liquid dual extracts of Red Reishi mushrooms (Ganoderma Lucidum) published this Summer shows a reversal of obesity related symptoms by altering the balance of good and bad gut bacteria.

“Mice kept on a high-fat diet gained up to 25 percent more than mice kept on the same diet with extracts from the Reishi mushroom,” said David Ojcius, a microbiologist at the University of the Pacific School of Dentistry in San Francisco who participated in the study, published Tuesday in the journal Nature Communications. Consumption of Reishi mushroom extract with high-fat food prevented the development of fat tissue, gut inflammation and buildup of harmful bacteria in the bloodstream — all symptoms of obesity in both mice and humans.

The study also shows an adaptogenic effect, meaning the liquid mushroom extracts slimmed down overweight mice only, not mice with healthy weights. Prebiotic uses of this medicinal fungi builds on research that increasingly points to a balance of gut bacteria addressing overall health and well-being, including obesity.

An early hint that gut microbes might play a role in obesity came from studies comparing intestinal bacteria in obese and lean individuals. In studies of twins who were both lean or both obese, researchers found that the gut community in lean people was like a rain forest brimming with many species but that the community in obese people was less diverse—more like a nutrient-overloaded pond where relatively few species dominate.

Nature’s Remedy: Half Hill Farm has created a high quality Red Reishi dual extract using USDA certified organic ganoderma lucidum, USDA certified organic USP pharmaceutical-grade alcohol and distilled water. You can purchase our Red Reishi Mushroom Dual Extract in 100 ml (3.38 oz.) or 200 ml (6.76 oz.) bottles.

DISCLAIMER: Please consult your physician before using any of our products for health purposes. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. 

Local farm makes medicinal extracts from native mushrooms

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Farmers turn to cancer-fighting – Cannon Courier – April 9, 2014

(WOODBURY, TN) Mushrooms are revered in ancient herbal medicine as a cure-all for everything from colds and flu to cancer. With recent research validating some of this ancient wisdom, a local organic farm is turning native Turkey Tail mushrooms into medicinal extracts.

Half Hill Farm is a small seven acre USDA Certified Organic farm in Woodbury, TN specializing in apples, blueberries, hops and mushrooms. But a recent cancer diagnosis for one of the owner’s 72 year old mother made mushrooms a priority.

“Cancer has a way of making you change your priorities and rethink your life routines,” said farm co-owner Vince Oropesa. Last year his mother was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. Working with her doctors in Murfreesboro, he began providing her with extracts from a native Turkey Tail mushroom as an adjunct therapy to chemo treatments.

“She was at a stage in her health and age where the doctors left it to her whether to go through chemo,” Oropesa said. “We take it a day at a time, but she has surprised us and the doctors through every turn. She’s a real fighter.”

Months before the cancer diagnosis, Oropesa and his husband Christian Grantham began building farm infrastructure to cultivate edible mushrooms for local markets.

“When we got the news of Sandy’s diagnosis, our priorities shifted as well to research on medicinal mushrooms growing in our own back yard,” Grantham said.

What the farmers found opened their eyes to an opportunity to not only help Vince’s mother, but also many people dealing with cancer and other illnesses.

“It was a real wake up call to pay attention to what was literally growing right under our noses,” Grantham added. “Life has a way of doing that, and it’s up to us how we respond to that opportunity.”

Turkey Tail (Trametes Versicolor) grows wild throughout Tennessee and the world. The anti-cancer properties of extracted polysaccharides (PSK) and polypeptides (PSP) from Turkey Tail mushrooms are approved cancer drugs in Japan. Private research in America has been limited because pharmaceutical companies cannot patent the results. That has prompted the U.S. government to start funding research.

In late 2012, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved a $5.4 million grant to study 4-6 gram daily doses of Turkey Tail mushroom extract on stage IV colon and lung cancer. This comes on the heels of promising National Institute of Health (NIH) research on breast cancer. The funding also follows a University of Pennsylvania study showing Turkey Tail mushroom extracts dramatically increases life expectancy for pets with cancer.

“The NIH studies alone showing enhanced Natural Killer (NK) cells and reduced tumor growth in breast cancer patients was enough for us to immediately start Vince’s mother on Turkey Tails,” Grantham said.

Since creating their mushroom extracts, Oropesa and Grantham find interest mostly from people whose illness has them searching for natural alternatives and adjunct therapies. The two say the extracts they are creating on their farm are just as effective as preventative treatment.

“We take our extracts everyday,” Grantham said. “We do Turkey Tail in our morning coffee and Reishi in our evening tea. We’re not doctors, so we try not to talk about how we feel because we don’t want to sound crazy, but it is turning into a life-long routine for us.”

The dual extraction process subjects dried mushrooms to a lengthy hot water and alcohol extraction process that takes a month to complete. The result is a 1:1 concentrated dual extract you can mix into foods or drink.

Most of the farm’s customers for extracts are people whose priorities have changed due to illness. To bring their medicinal extracts to a larger market, the two farmers are taking a page from the medicinal marijuana industry and are infusing their product in food.


Red Reishi Mushroom 1:1 dual extract – available as gifts and soon as infused chocolates from our farm’s online store.

“Most people who aren’t sick don’t quiet understand what to do with our extracts, and that’s OK,” Oropesa said. “But everybody understands chocolate, and most eat them before we have a chance to tell them how good it is for them.”

Half Hill Farm offers Spring and Fall workshops on growing your own edible and medicinal mushrooms on oak logs as well as how to make your own extracts. Their mushroom extracts and infused chocolates will be available online soon.

PURCHASE NOW: Buy our Turkey Tail or Red Reishi extracts online.

Learn more:

DISCLAIMER: I am a farmer. I am not a doctor. Please consult your physician before using any of our products for health purposes. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. Our products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. These food products were made in a private home not licensed or inspected.

Red Reishi mushroom dual extract tincture

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Here’s a look at our label for 100 and 200 ml bottles of Half Hill Farm’s Red Reishi mushroom 1:1 dual extract, a blend of hot water and alcohol extractions of organic Ganoderma lucidum in premium Miron ultraviolet glass.

Our first 29 of our first 100 ml bottles are now available as gifts to those who give $50 or more to our outhouse & workshop shelter project. Your generous gift will also reconnect people to a rural farm experience while changing the way people think about their food and health!

PURCHASE NOW: Buy our Turkey Tail or Red Reishi mushroom 1:1 dual extracts online. Here are links to research of benefits to using dual extracts of Reishi and Turkey Tail.

Here’s our Red Reishi 1:1 dual extract without the label: chocolate, pestled Red Pepper flakes, cinnamon and a daily dose of extract in every bite.

They barely lasted a day. Chocolate from the heart, for the heart! We can’t wait for you to try it.

RECIPE: Red Reishi and Turkey Tail mushroom extracts

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2 1/2 quarts of Red Reishi extract made at Half Hill Farm. Purchase our 1:1 dual extracts.

Red Reishi (Ganoderma lucidum) and Turkey Tail (Trametes Versicolor) mushrooms have been widely known for their medicinal value for centuries. Today, new studies reveal anti-cancer and anti-viral properties of high concentrations of polysaccharide K (PSK – an approved cancer drug) and lesser studied triterpenoids in both mushrooms. Last year, the FDA approved a $5 million study focusing on use of Turkey Tail PSK adjunctive treatment for stage four colon and lung cancers after promising results from an NIH study on breast cancer patients.

Many people mistake these two particular mushrooms as edible. Some websites actually prescribe so many grams of these dried mushrooms. The fact is, you cannot fully digest these medicinal mushrooms. The protein-bound polysaccharides can only be extracted through a several hour decoction process while triterpenoids typically are extracted over several days in an alcohol solution. You certainly won’t die eating these mushrooms, but the best way to realize the full health benefits is to create a single or dual extract.

SINGLE EXTRACT (DECOCTION): A typical decoction is a 1 oz of dry mushroom to 1 cup of water. A single decoction will extract water solubles such as polysaccaharide K (PSK) and beneficial polypeptides (PSP).

  • 1 oz dried Red Reishi or dried Turkey Tail mushrooms
  • 2 cups of distilled or purified water

Take 1 oz. of the mushroom of your choice and place them in 2 cups of water. If you are using Reishi you will need to chop it up as close to 1 inch squares as you can. You can break it up into small pieces. Boil for 3-4 hours, reduce to between a light boil and simmer after the first 30 minutes. At the end, remove the mushrooms. You will then want to filter out any pieces of mushrooms. Your two cups should have reduced to close to a cup, including whatever you can squeeze out of your mushrooms.

Jar and store in the fridge for about 1 week before discarding. Take 2-6 teaspoons twice daily. Reishi is very bitter and best in coffee or soup broths.

DUAL EXTRACT: To extract antifungal, antibacterial, antiviral triterpenoids and other medicinal compounds present in the fruit body of the mushrooms, you will need to take the mushrooms from the first process and place them in a high proof alcohol for a month and blend them using proofing formulas.

OTHER USES: Our first use for these extracts is 1 tablespoon in 16 oz. soup servings we are making for Vince’s mother who was recently diagnosed at age 72 with stage IV lung cancer.

You can put 2 teaspoons of either extract in coffee and tea, or slightly more in soup, stews, or water you use to cook things like rice or even larger recipes calling for fluids.

WHERE TO GET: Growing your own medicinal mushrooms and following the steps above is the most affordable way to get extracts. We offer 1 foot logs inoculated with either mushrooms through our online store or larger logs for pick up at our farm in Woodbury, TN. This is the most economical way to grow your own. It takes several months for the logs to fruit and will produce seasonally for 3-5 years.

PURCHASE NOW: Our farm makes quality dual extracts of both Turkey Tail and Red Reishi mushrooms using distilled water and USDA certified organic alcohol (USP). Buy our Turkey Tail or Red Reishi extracts online.

Ganoderma Lucidum dual extract

Research on Turkey Tail (Trametes Versicolor) mushrooms

Research on Red Reishi (Ganoderma lucidum) mushrooms

DISCLAIMER: I am a farmer. I am not a doctor. Please consult your physician before using any of our products for health purposes. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. Our products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.

Turkey Tail mushrooms and our personal fight against cancer

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Trametes Versicolor growing on a down tree at Half Hill Farm.

Just before Thanksgiving, Vince’s mother Sandy went to the hospital with what was believed to be pneumonia. It was determined after a few restless days of testing that she had stage IV non-small cell lung cancer and was quickly put on chemotherapy.

The diagnosis was abrupt and shocking. At 71 years of age, the prognosis is also very uncertain. Despite this, Sandy takes one day at a time with lots of family support, focused treatment and hopefully a little extra help from our own backyard.

Sandy’s primary treatment is carboplatin with thoracentesis as needed to remove a build up of fluid outside her lungs caused by the cancer. After speaking with her oncologist about our research into mushrooms, Vince convinced his mom to take a twice daily dose of Turkey Tail mushrooms (Trametes or Coriolus Versicolor) starting with her first treatment.

Turkey Tails are a common mushroom that grows throughout the woods of Tennessee and all over the world. Our interest in the science behind the anti-viral and anti-cancer properties of Turkey Tails began shortly after seeing preliminary clinical trial results and an anecdotal story in a TED lecture last year by mycologist Paul Stamets. In the last two minutes of the speech, Stamets described his 84 year old mother’s successful fight against stage IV breast cancer that included taking Turkey Tail mushrooms. She was a deeply religious person who hadn’t been to the doctor since 1968. According to Stamets, it was the second worst case of stage IV breast cancer her doctor had ever seen, and she was given three months to live. She’s now cancer free.

The early clinical trial data and Paul’s hopeful story resonated, and Vince didn’t hesitate to start his mother on Turkey Tails. At the same time, we began cultivating this amazing mushroom on our farm with a deeper sense of purpose.

We realize mushrooms aren’t a cure for cancer. Less is known about effects of Turkey Tails on stage IV cancers, but we know it will be the very best way we can help her body heal naturally with virtually no side effects or interference with her primary treatment. Below is some of the science behind how Turkey Tails (used with chemo or radiation) significantly enhance the body’s natural defense against cancer cells and extend disease free survival.

Research: New studies of Turkey Tails here in the U.S. are focused on the mushroom’s high percentage of protein bound polysaccharide (PSK) concentrations and how they help the body fight cancer cells.

Given these results, why aren’t Turkey Tail mushrooms a common adjunct therapy in the United States? What we discovered is using Turkey Tails is still viewed as an alternative medicine by most professional health care providers in the U.S.. Due to its widely known medicinal properties, its use in medicine cannot be patented which limits its commercial appeal for major drug companies. That often leaves finding and researching this treatment option up to patients. That may soon change thanks to new government-funded clinical trial research from the National Institute of Health’s Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM).

The best way to make and take Turkey Tail mushrooms: The most popular way to take Turkey Tail mushrooms is in a capsule, but the body has a hard time digesting the mushroom’s tough chitinous cellular structure (which is why you don’t see recipes for eating it).

Capsules are also the cheapest and easiest way to manufacture mushroom supplements using ground mycelium grown on rice or grain. This is the preferred method of many larger manufacturers because it saves them time and money.

The best way to realize the full spectrum of benefits is by using the mature fruited mushroom, which takes months to grow, through a decoction (a lengthy hot water extraction to concentrate water soluble polysaccharides and other beneficial compounds).

Tinctures are alcohol extractions of adaptogenic triterpenoids. The better quality extract blends both the decoction and tincture in a dual extraction. This is also the preferred method of botanical extraction by ethnobotanists and scientists conducting tests and trials.

Capsules that simply grind this mushroom into powder are not extracts and can contain ground up rice used to grow the mycelium. Because we could not find a quality product we trusted with our own mother, we created a Turkey Tail mushroom dual extract using USDA certified organic mushrooms grown on our farm, USDA certified organic USP alcohol (pharmaceutical grade) and distilled water just like the standardized method outlined in studies, but with two more proprietary steps that also use vacuum. You can now buy our Turkey Tail, Red Reishi, Chaga, Cordyceps, or Lion’s Mane mushroom extracts online and expect the exact same level of quality and care.

Read more on Half Hill Farm’s mushroom dual extracts:

See more of our products we’ve developed and that have been used successfully by customers since this post:

DISCLAIMER: Please consult your physician before using any of our products for health purposes. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. Our products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.