July 27, 2021

This paid piece is sponsored by Vanguard Hospitality.

For Daniel Rislov, inspiration struck watching a YouTube video.

The creator’s name was The Mush Farmer, and he was growing mushrooms in his basement.

It wasn’t long before that was Rislov.

“It started in my apartment,” he explained. “I was doing community gardens for fun, and I was really into urban farming and learning how to garden.”

He kept watching YouTube videos, read books about mushrooms and began to learn the do’s and don’ts. His first attempt was in his downtown apartment in 2015. When he gained a basement with a move, the mushroom operation was relocated there.

Rislov now operates Dakota Mushrooms & Microgreens out of a rented section of a warehouse complex in southwest Sioux Falls.

“It’s been pretty steady the past six years,” he said. “My busy season, I’m growing maybe 300 to 400 pounds a week, and my facility is capable of doing three times that if I wanted to.”

Some of those mushrooms end up on the menu at Vanguard Hospitality restaurants.

Want to add mushrooms to your steak at Morrie’s Steakhouse? They’re going to be from Dakota Mushrooms.

“I love his products. I love how he adapted, started freeze-drying and making extracts and salts,” executive chef Joshua Jackson said.

“He also makes a mushroom powder we’ve purchased, and we’re playing around with that in the kitchen, so you might see some dishes crafted with it in the future.”

And at Minervas, the mushrooms are featured on the restaurant’s signature market bar.

“We take the wild mushrooms from Dakota Mushroom and add some cremini and button tops into the mix, and they go right on the salad bar,” said Jordan Klein, garde manger at Minervas, who curates the Market Bar.

“It’s an unusual mushroom that not everyone has seen and with flavor and taste people enjoy.”

The relationship is one example of a broader approach being taken at Vanguard Hospitality, chief operating officer Tim Meagher said.

“We’re using local producers as much as we can,” he said.

“Supporting this movement in our state and community in the end makes all of us stronger and more reliant internally instead of relying on exports. As long as we can find the quantity we need, we want to source locally. When you visit Minervas, for instance, you’re definitely going to see that reflected in our upgraded Market Bar, and you’ll experience it throughout the menus at all our restaurants.”

Both Minervas and Morrie’s buy mixed boxes, “so it’s a variety of six different mushrooms,” Rislov said.

Rislov does all the work himself, which is a growing amount. He also supplies local grocery stores and farmers markets in Sioux Falls and Sioux City.

“In 2020, I went full time and then COVID hit, and I got a part-time job, but now I’ve been full time for the past six or seven months,” he said, adding he’s always trying out new varieties of mushrooms and microgreens.

“I’ve read some books three times each on growing gourmet and medicinal mushrooms, and that gave me a foundation. It’s been trial and error from there.”

To learn more about Dakota Mushrooms & Microgreens, click here or stop in at Minervas or Morrie’s Steakhouse to try them for yourself!