Agaricus subrufescens (syn. Agaricus blazei, Agaricus brasiliensis or Agaricus rufotegulis) is a species of mushroom, commonly known as almond mushroom, almond agaricus, mushroom of the sun, God's mushroom, mushroom of life, royal sun agaricus, jisongrong, or himematsutake (Chinese: 姬松茸, Japanese: 姫まつたけ, "princess matsutake"). A. subrufescens is edible, with a somewhat sweet taste and a fragrance of almonds.
According to tradition, it fights physical and emotional stress, stimulates the immune system, improves the quality of life in diabetics, reduces cholesterol, prevents osteoporosis and peptic ulcers, treats circulatory and digestive problems and fights cancer.
According to the conclusions of:
This review on scientific in vivo findings with three of the most well-known medicinal mushrooms, AbM, HE and GF, shows that they possess valuable antitumor, anti-inflammatory and antiallergic properties. These should be investigated more thoroughly with quality-controlled and standardized mushroom extracts, or fractions thereof, in randomized clinical studies powered to show putative therapeutic effects. In this way, medicinal Basidomycota could become significant supplementary drugs in Western medicine.
Photo thanks to George Chernilevsky, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
