// Uncle Spore · Equipment & shopping list
Uncle Spore’s Beginner Shopping List
Twenty things. That’s the lot. Everything here earns its place in the method from Article 3 — liquid culture, agar testing, popcorn grain spawn and a coir bulk. No fogging towers, no sensor farms, no “starter bundles” full of things you’ll never open.
Money goes on sterilisation first. A good pressure cooker and clean technique will do more for your yield than any gadget with a touchscreen.
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0 of 20 ticked off · 16 essentials. Saved on this device only.
Sterilisation & vessels
Everything that has to survive the pressure cooker. Get this bit right and most of the rest becomes rather easier.
01 · Essential
Stovetop pressure cooker or canner (15 PSI)
The one purchase that genuinely matters. Liquid culture, agar and grain all need to reach sterilising temperature, and a kitchen saucepan simply cannot do it.
What to look for: Look for a stovetop model with a manufacturer-rated 15 PSI setting and a working gauge or weighted regulator — at 15 PSI, water boils at roughly 121 °C. Check the internal height and diameter fit your jars or bags with a trivet underneath. Some electric multicookers run nearer 11 PSI; they can work for specific validated processes but are not automatically equivalent, so do not assume a 15 PSI timing applies.
Safety: Follow the manufacturer’s instructions exactly. Never modify, weight down or tamper with pressure valves or safety vents, and never open it until pressure has fully dropped.
Uncle Spore says: Measure your jars before you measure your bank balance. A cooker that holds three jars when you wanted seven is a very slow way to save money.
- Expand LC
- Test on agar
- Prepare grain
- Inoculate
Product selection under review02 · Essential
Wide-mouth jars with filter and injection-port lids
Heat-resistant glass jars for liquid culture (and small grain batches), fitted with lids that breathe through a filter and accept a needle through a self-healing port.
What to look for: Wide-mouth preserving jars rated for pressure canning. Lids should have a fitted gas-exchange filter and an injection port, and must suit the jar’s mouth size exactly — wide-mouth and regular-mouth are not interchangeable.
Uncle Spore says: Buy the jars and the lids as a matched pair. ‘It nearly fits’ is how contamination gets in.
- Expand LC
- Prepare grain
- Inoculate
Product selection under review
Liquid culture & agar
Growing your culture and checking it before you trust it with a bag of grain.
03 · Essential
Light dried malt extract (DME) powder
The food in your liquid culture and the sugar in your agar. Plain, light and dry is what you want.
What to look for: Plain light DME powder, sold for home brewing. Avoid liquid malt syrup, hopped extracts and anything with added flavourings — they are harder to measure and darker extracts can caramelise under pressure.
Uncle Spore says: One bag lasts an absurdly long time. Keep it sealed; damp malt turns into a brick with ambitions.
- Expand LC
- Test on agar
Product selection under review04 · Optional
Magnetic stirrer and PTFE stir bars
Keeps liquid culture moving so mycelium breaks up and spreads evenly. Useful, not essential.
What to look for: A small lab stir plate plus PTFE-coated stir bars that fit through your jar mouth and survive pressure cooking. Gentle swirling by hand once or twice a day does the same job, just less elegantly.
Uncle Spore says: Nice to have. If the budget’s tight, your wrist is free and works on weekends.
- Expand LC
Product selection under review05 · Essential
PP5 heat-safe pots for no-pour agar
Small polypropylene (PP5) pots you fill with agar, sterilise with the lid on and never open until they are needed — the no-pour method.
What to look for: Pots marked PP5 / polypropylene and rated for autoclaving. Check the lid is heat-tolerant too: some pots are PP5 while the lids are not, and those lids warp or melt. Clear pots make checking growth far easier.
Uncle Spore says: Test one pot through a full cycle before buying a hundred. Melted lids are a lesson best learned once and cheaply.
- Test on agar
Product selection under review06 · Essential
Plain agar-agar powder
The gelling agent for agar. With light DME it makes a simple malt extract agar for testing your culture.
What to look for: Plain food- or lab-grade agar-agar powder without added sugar or flavour. Powder dissolves more predictably than flakes or strips.
Uncle Spore says: Agar sets at room temperature, so pour or fill before it decides to set in the jug.
- Test on agar
Product selection under review18 · Essential
Legal culinary mushroom liquid culture (or spores)
Your genetics, from a reputable supplier. Legal edible species only — oyster mushrooms are the friendliest place to start.
What to look for: Liquid culture is recommended for beginners; spores need germinating and selecting. Buy from a supplier with clear species labelling and contamination guarantees. Match the species to your substrate: many favourites — including most oysters at their best, lion’s mane and shiitake — are wood-lovers that need hardwood-based substrate, and are not well suited to coir alone.
Uncle Spore says: Cheap culture is the most expensive thing on this list. Buy good genetics once.
- Buy LC
- Expand LC
Product selection under review
Clean work & inoculation
Needles, blades and the box you work in. Clean, calm and still — not sterile, but a lot better than the kitchen table in a draught.
07 · Essential
Scalpel handle with sterile disposable blades
For cutting and moving small wedges of agar. Individually wrapped sterile blades avoid flaming and blunting.
What to look for: A standard handle with matching individually wrapped sterile blades (for example No. 3 handle with No. 10 or 11 blades). Check the blade and handle numbers match.
Safety: Fit and remove blades with care and dispose of used blades in a proper sharps container.
Uncle Spore says: New blade for new work. They’re cheap; contaminated agar isn’t.
- Test on agar
Product selection under review08 · Essential
Sterile needles (Luer-lock compatible)
Individually packed sterile needles for inoculating through injection ports.
What to look for: Individually sealed sterile hypodermic needles with a Luer-lock hub that matches your syringes. Around 16–18 gauge suits liquid culture; very fine needles clog.
Safety: Handle sharps carefully, never recap towards your hand, and dispose of them in a sharps container.
Uncle Spore says: One needle, one job. Then into the sharps box, not the kitchen bin.
- Expand LC
- Inoculate
Product selection under review09 · Essential
Sterile Luer-lock syringes
For drawing liquid culture and moving it into jars or grain bags.
What to look for: Individually wrapped sterile Luer-lock syringes, typically 10–20 ml. Luer-lock screws the needle on so it can’t pop off mid-inoculation.
Uncle Spore says: Luer-lock, not slip tip. You’ll only need to fire a needle across the room once to agree.
- Expand LC
- Inoculate
Product selection under review10 · Recommended
Micropore breathable tape
Breathable surgical tape for sealing agar pots and covering ports after use.
What to look for: Paper micropore-type surgical tape (3M Micropore or equivalent), around 25 mm wide. It lets gas through while keeping dust and spores out.
Uncle Spore says: Wrap agar lids once, neatly. Six layers of tape is not extra safe — it’s just suffocating.
- Test on agar
- Inoculate
Product selection under review11 · Essential
70% isopropyl alcohol (IPA) spray
For wiping surfaces, gloves, ports and the outside of everything that goes into your still-air box.
What to look for: About 70% IPA in water is the useful strength for surface disinfection; 99% evaporates too quickly to work well. A trigger or fine-mist spray bottle is easiest.
Safety: IPA is highly flammable. Keep it well away from flames, hobs and lighters, and let it evaporate before using anything hot.
Uncle Spore says: Wipe, wait a moment, then work. Spraying and immediately grabbing defeats the point.
- Test on agar
- Inoculate
- Spawn to bulk
Product selection under review14 · Recommended
Self-healing injection ports
Stick-on silicone ports for bags and lids, so you can inoculate through a needle without opening anything.
What to look for: Self-healing silicone injection ports with adhesive backing, suitable for pressure-cooker temperatures. Apply to clean, dry surfaces only.
Uncle Spore says: Wipe the port with IPA every time before the needle goes in. Every time.
- Expand LC
- Inoculate
Product selection under review17 · Essential
Still-air box (DIY from a storage tub)
A clear box you work inside to reduce moving air while inoculating or handling agar.
What to look for: Make it from one large clear storage tub with two arm holes cut in the side. It minimises airflow; it does not make anything sterile, so clean technique still matters. You don’t need to buy both a tub and a ready-made box.
Uncle Spore says: Still air, slow hands, no sneezing. It’s a box, not a miracle.
- Test on agar
- Inoculate
Product selection under review
Grain spawn
Popcorn, bags and a way to close them properly.
12 · Essential
Autoclavable filter-patch grain bags
Polypropylene bags with a filter patch, for sterilising and colonising popcorn grain spawn.
What to look for: Autoclavable polypropylene bags (often around 3–5 lb capacity) with a fine filter patch. Check they fit inside your pressure cooker and seal with an impulse sealer.
Uncle Spore says: Fold the top so the filter can’t touch the cooker wall. A scorched filter is a filter with opinions.
- Prepare grain
- Inoculate
- Colonise
Product selection under review16 · Essential
Impulse bag sealer for polypropylene bags
Seals filter-patch bags properly after filling and after inoculation.
What to look for: An impulse heat sealer with a sealing length wider than your bags (around 30–40 cm suits most). Look for adjustable heat — polypropylene needs a firm, even seal.
Uncle Spore says: Do two seals, a finger apart. Belt and braces, as my father said about everything.
- Prepare grain
- Inoculate
- Spawn to bulk
Product selection under review19 · Essential
Plain popping corn kernels
The grain for our grain spawn: cheap, consistent and easy to hydrate evenly.
What to look for: Plain, unpopped popcorn kernels with no oil, salt, sugar or flavourings. Microwave popcorn bags are not a substitute.
Uncle Spore says: If it says ‘butter flavour’, it belongs at the cinema, not in your pressure cooker.
- Prepare grain
Product selection under review
Bulk substrate & fruiting
Where the mycelium finally earns its keep.
13 · Essential
Larger filtered bags for bulk substrate
Bigger filter-patch bags to mix colonised grain into prepared substrate and let it colonise before fruiting.
What to look for: Larger polypropylene filter-patch bags sized for your substrate volume. They need to seal reliably and handle mixing without splitting.
Uncle Spore says: Leave enough headroom to mix properly. Shaking a bag filled to the brim is mostly wishful thinking.
- Spawn to bulk
- Colonise
- Fruiting
Product selection under review15 · Recommended
Large transparent storage tubs
Clear tubs keep colonising bags tidy, protected and easy to inspect. One large tub can also become your still-air box.
What to look for: Clear lidded tubs of roughly 60–80 litres. If one is destined to be a still-air box, choose rigid clear sides you can cut arm holes into.
Uncle Spore says: Buy one big tub and turn it into a still-air box. Buying a ready-made box as well is how shelves fill up.
- Colonise
- Fruiting
Product selection under review20 · Essential
Plain coco coir brick (compressed)
Our beginner bulk substrate for now: cheap, clean and easy to hydrate. Not a universal substrate.
What to look for: Plain compressed coco coir without added fertiliser, wetting agents or nutrients. Coir suits some species well, but it is not ideal for every edible mushroom — wood-loving species such as lion’s mane and shiitake (and many oysters at their best) need hardwood-based substrate.
Uncle Spore says: Coir’s a sensible place to start, not the end of the conversation. Match the substrate to the mushroom.
- Prepare substrate
- Spawn to bulk
Product selection under review
What Uncle Spore isn’t buying (yet)
- An automated fruiting chamber. Lovely. Optional. Get a few clean grows done first.
- A ready-made still-air box and a tub. One clear tub with two arm holes does the job.
- A flow hood. Brilliant kit, but not where a beginner’s money should go.
- Every substrate going. We’re starting with coir only — and it isn’t right for wood-lovers like lion’s mane and shiitake. Check the substrate selector before you buy culture.
Keep reading
- Uncle Spore’s Basic Grow Guide
- Article 3 — The Method
- The wider equipment checklist
- Gear recommendations
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Record your first grow