Meet the Mushroom Queen

published in HOMEBusinessJournal.net June 2003
by Sue Fagalde Lick

Marjie Millard knows her mushrooms. If she isn't picking them or selling them through Millard Family Mushrooms, she's cooking soups, quiches, or coffeecakes with them. Eager to educate people about how to safely enjoy the fungi that grow wild all over western Oregon, she gives talks, leads walks at the annual Yachats Mushroom Festival, and identifies mushrooms for people who aren't sure of what they've picked.

Early in their marriage, Millard and her husband Tom spent five years as commercial mushroom pickers, following the seasons throughout the Northwest. After their two children were born, Tom got a "real job" with a tree service, but Marjie continued to pick mushrooms as a hobby, taking her kids to the woods with her when they were old enough. Five years ago, she decided to go into business.

The bags of fresh and dried mushrooms that she took to the local farmers' markets sold well, but things really took off when she created her Cream of Wild Mushroom Soup, a blend of dried King Bolete and Black Trumpet Chanterell mushrooms with a creamy base. When she first brought a crockpot of soup to the Yachats farmers' market, she sold 10 packages of mix in 15 minutes.

Today Millard sells mushrooms and soup mixes at several farmers' markets and to restaurants in the Portland area. She also sells nationwide thru her Web site. Her kitchen is perfumed with the musty odor of mushrooms, warm quiche seasoned with Chanterelles and King Boletes, and fresh coffeecake sweetened with maple-flavored Candy Cap mushrooms.

Mushrooms are low in calories and fat and high in protien if properly cooked, Millard says. Although most people see only the commercially farmed white button mushrooms sold at the grocery store, many other varieties grow wild. In western Oregon, she picks Black and Yellow-Foot Chanterelles, Morels, Hedgehogs, Lobsters, King Boletes, Chicken of the Woods, Matsutakes, Caulifower, and Cat's Paws.

From May through January, Millard spends at least one day a week picking mushrooms. "It's not a nice calm little walk in the woods," she says. "You're going through brush brush that's over your head and you're dirty. You've got spider webs all over you. It always semms that the really good patches are just inudated with wild roses and Oregon grapes. A lot of times you've got to go straight uphill." In summer, they battle bees and they worry about ticks year-round, she adds.

Unlike most people, Millard frowns when the sun shines in November. Too much warm weather and the mushroom pickings are slim. If the temperature dips below freezing for long, the harvest turns to mush. When mushrooms grow scarce, she if forced to buy mushrooms from other areas to supply her customers, but usually she can find enough close to home.

Millard picks carefully on both National Forest and private land, leaving the smallest and the oldest plants to provide future growth. There aren't many commercial pickers in the area, so the supply is usually good.

Mushrooms are delicate and short-lived. Some, like the Morels and King Bolets, need to be cooked within a day or two after they are picked. Others last up to a week. Millard tries to pick her mushrooms the day before the sale and she urges her customers to cook them right away. What she doesn't sell fresh, she dries in a food dehydrator. Most people don't even realize they can grind up dried mushrooms and use them in many different recipes. For example, the Candy Caps are great in pancakes, bagels, or baked beans.

Millard went into business because she wanted to share her love of mushrooms. "We have all these mushrooms right in Oregon that typically are shipped to the East Coast or overseas; immediately they're in five-star restaurants, but we just don't have them locally. That's kind of what got me going. I wanted people to have an opportunity to eat them at a reasonable price."

Others wanting to start picking mushrooms should not just head out to the woods with a plastic bag and start picking, Millard cautions. Because some mushrooms are toxic, beginners should take someone along who knows what he's doing and never eat what they pick without being certain it's safe.


Freelance writer Sue Fagalde Lick operates a business from her home in South Beach, Oregon. She is the author of three books on Portuguese Americans.