Mushrooms are considered a delicacy and you can cook a lot of delicious dishes and great snacks from them. Many people know that this is a source of valuable vegetable protein, but due to their beneficial properties, mushrooms can also be used as medicines.
Useful properties of mushrooms
In addition to protein, mushrooms contain all the other ingredients necessary for the normal functioning of the body: carbohydrates, fats, trace elements and vitamins. The main part of the mushroom is water, depending on the species, its amount can be from 84 to 94%. The dry residue contains more than half of nitrogenous compounds, most of which - about 70% - protein. Fats in mushrooms are few - only about 0.5%. The carbohydrate compounds found in mushrooms include glucose, sugar alcohol mannitol and sugar trehalose, a specific natural sugar that is found only in their composition. There is no fiber, as such, in mushrooms, but instead of it, they contain a special substance - fungin, which is similar to fiber in its cleaning and adsorbing effect on the body.
Mushrooms are perishable and must be processed and eaten within 1 to 2 days after being harvested.
Of the trace elements that make up about 1% of their weight, potassium, iron, phosphorus, chlorine and zinc salts can be found in mushrooms. They are also rich in vitamins. There is carotene - a plant version of retinol - vitamin A, as well as B vitamins: B1 and B2, C and PP. The content of vitamins in different types of mushrooms is different, the most "fortified" are chanterelles. In terms of their nutritional value, mushrooms are also different, it also depends on the age of the mushroom - the most valuable in this regard are young mushrooms. Even different parts of the mushroom have different nutritional values - the cap is preferable to the leg.
The healing properties of mushrooms disappear during heat treatment, so it is better to salt them in a cold way.
Medicinal properties of mushrooms
The medicinal properties of mushrooms, which can be used boiled, fried and dry, are largely due to their chemical composition. Their inedible variety, mold, is grown under artificial conditions and is used to produce antibiotics: penicillin and biomycin, thanks to which many previously considered fatal diseases have become curable.
Even edible old mushrooms are dangerous due to the presence of protein breakdown products in them, which can cause poisoning.
Edible mushrooms are also used in traditional medicine. The extract from the caps of dried porcini mushrooms is used in lotions for frostbitten areas of the body. Poisonous mushrooms in small doses also have a healing effect. False honey mushrooms are an excellent laxative and emetic that was used to treat gastrointestinal diseases. Pepper fungus has been used to treat kidney disease, tuberculosis, and lung disease, and the deadly pallid grebe in microscopic dosages has been used to treat cholera. Rheumatism can be treated with alcoholic infusions of red fly agaric, which contain the toxic substances muscarin and muscaridin, as well as the substance muscarufin, which acts as an antibiotic that enhances the activity of the endocrine glands and has the ability to increase the overall tone of the body.
