Quality & Ingredients
About DIRTEA
Mushrooms are astonishing. But what makes DIRTEA mushrooms the best?
Simply put, DIRTEA provides the purest and most potent mushrooms around - 2000mg per serving to be exact. With functional fungi growing in popularity, knowing your sources and finding a brand you trust has never been more important. As we’re right at the forefront of a mainstream mushroom revolution, we reckon you’ve found an excellent place to dig up the details.
So, pour yourself a cup of your favourite mushroom blend as we spill the tea on our ingredients, recipes and processes. When you sip on your DIRTEA concoction, rest assured that your mind and body are being treated to the highest quality recipe possible.
What goes into our products?
For our core mushroom range, just mushrooms. That’s it. 100% pure, fungi-powered goodness. Introduce yourself to the big five:
- DIRTEA Reishi
- DIRTEA Chaga
- DIRTEA Cordyceps
- DIRTEA Lion’s Mane
- DIRTEA Tremella
For our Super Blends, we add only the finest organic ingredients proven for their transformative powers and natural flavours. Say hello to this tasty bunch:
- DIRTEA Cacao Super Blend
- DIRTEA Coffee Super Blend
- DIRTEA Matcha Super Blend
Take a look at some of the ingredients we love to add to our pure and potent mushrooms:
- Coconut Milk Powder
- MCT
- Moringa
- Pink Himalayan Salt
- Maca
- Ashwagandha
Why choose DIRTEA?
Our mantra says it all: we’re pure and potent from forest to cup. That means you’re getting our mushrooms as nature intended - with 100% fruiting bodies. They’re also third-party tested for heavy metals and contaminants and have been extracted using a double extraction process to obtain the active components you need.
There are undoubtedly many choices out there. But only one brand offers you 2000mg per serving, and that’s DIRTEA. Our sources and processes are unrivalled - because we followed the science, and it took us to the best functional mushroom farmers in the world. When you love mushrooms as much as we do, it’s a passion, not a chore.
Tell me more about the DIRTEA process
The story of our process begins in the rolling mountains where our forest-shaded greenhouses and small family farms are located, far away from the urban lowland centres. All our mushrooms are organically grown. However, the exact location will vary depending on the climate best suited for the strain. For example, the Reishi and Lion’s Mane are grown in shade houses in more humid areas, Cordyceps are grown indoors with precise climate controls, and Chaga is wild harvested. Once grown, it’s time for picking.
Tell me about the extraction process
Before we jump ahead, it’s worth giving you a quick mycology lesson to better appreciate the care that goes into every batch.
- A mushroom is the reproductive part of the organism we call fungi
- Fungi have two main parts: the mycelium (which can be compared to the tree) and the mushroom (which can be compared to the fruit)
- The mycelium lives underground and can spread for hundreds of miles. When the mycelium wants to reproduce, one of the ways is to produce a fruit - a mushroom
- The mushroom releases spores, which mate to form more mycelium
- Our extracts are made from only pure mushrooms and DO NOT contain any mycelium or the grains and wood on which the mycelium is grown on
- All great mushroom extracts begin with a great mushroom
Now we delve into the extraction process…
This is the fun part - as every single one of our mushrooms is either hand selected by a team of pickers or forged by farmers. Next, they’re dried and crushed into a fine powder to create more surface area - allowing us to access more of the mushroom during the first extraction.
Depending on the strain, we use large pressure cookers filled with pure filtered water, which heats the cells and cracks the cell wall. We repeat this process up to three times to ensure all the target compounds are separated from the chitin. On its own, chitin is indigestible, but inside, it holds the secret: polysaccharides and beta-glucans. Once the cell wall is broken, these are released and become bio-available, so our body can metabolise them, and we can benefit from their fungal compounds.
Once the pressure cooking is completed, we separate the liquid from the fibre, then concentrate it to reach a specific density. Now, it’s ready for spray drying - which dries up any remaining moisture between the granules to prevent mould.
Next, we run the fine powder through a finer sieve to catch any coarse particles.
Then the only step left is to test our powder extracts for heavy metals, moulds and other unwanted chemicals. When the powders pass the quality control testing, we send them to the final testing phase to determine the polysaccharide content - by shining UV light through the powder to count the percentage of polysaccharides. We then package the extracted and tested concentrate powders so they look beautiful and are ready to serve.
Anything more we should know about testing?
- We send every batch to be tested by Eurofins Labs. (DAKKS certified).
- We test for over 500+ agri chemicals, heavy metals and moulds.
- If a test comes back positive for too many pesticides or any red-flagged chemicals, we do not use it. We source new fruits and start the process again.
- Our mushrooms are tested before and after the extraction process; we track every batch and follow rigorous best practices to ensure our mushrooms are of the highest quality.
- All our facilities are GMP (Good Manufacturing Practice) certified.
- We use the EU organic standard Regulations (EC) 834/2007 and (EC) 889/2008 and the EU Pesticides free 539 standards.
Our mushroom ratio
Extraction ratios are an expression of concentration rather than a measure of active compound potency. DIRTEA extraction ratios are as follows.
- Lion's mane: 8-12:1
- Chaga: 6-10:1.
- Reishi: 8-12:1
- Cordyceps: 8-12:1
- Turkey Tail: 8-12:1
- Tremella: 8-12:1
The best mushrooms are right here
Now you know our process in detail, from forest to cup! We follow the most rigorous testing and extraction process. You deserve the finest quality ingredients and we’re confident we have the best mushroom powders on the market. When we say pure and potent, we mean it.