IN HER own words Alisha Fuller-Armah is ‘a proud Black mushroom farmer in Scotland’. 

Having sold her former business as a proprietor of a destination wedding venue in Jamaica (Hummingbird Hall), just before the lockdown in 2019, Fuller-Armah told Lifestyle at that point in her life she was looking for new horizons, a new endeavour, a new place to call home. 

Her decision to leave the industry came about due to increasing competition from big corporate competition who were literally ripping off her ever evolving unique selling points, however, the one thing they couldn’t offer was wholesome, organic mushrooms. 

She says offering high quality mushrooms was a big hit with the clients who used to frequent her venue, but never in a million years did she realise just how her newly acquired skill-set, born out of a need to differentiate themselves from the fierce competition, would go down a storm in her new place of abode. 

Nestled within the remote wilds of south-west Scotland lies Fuller-Armah’s 15-acre estate, where she and her family cultivate an array of exquisite mushrooms. 

Remarkably, Fuller-Armah taught herself how to grow mushrooms using the internet and within just two years of returning to the UK, having lived in Jamaica for a decade, her produce had garnered admiration from discerning food enthusiasts and fine dining establishments alike. 

Establishing herself as the owner of one of Scotland’s leading gourmet mushroom farms, Fuller-Armah told the Voice Newspaper that while adjusting and settling into their new home proved a challenge, where they are now as a family and business owners is beyond their wildest dreams. 

“It’s been quite meteoric,” Fuller-Armah said. 

“I don’t want to sound arrogant. Maybe within a year and a half, people knew about us. “With agriculture here they want to know what you have been doing, almost for the last century, before some of the chefs, restaurants and farm shops will take you on.” 

Fuller-Armah resides with her mother and son, who, with the help of part-time staff members, run the Deer Manor Gourmet Mushrooms estate. 

She says they knew absolutely no one there when they arrived at what was a fairly dilapidated building. 

Despite that, the entrepreneur says the way they have been received by the locals, is “testament to how accepting they can be if you’re doing something new”. 

“It’s weird because my background is that I studied Art History and Social Anthropology (BA and MPhil at Cambridge University), and have a PhD in Business Management. But I didn’t have a background in farming at all.” 

She added: “In Jamaica our family had land, most people have land in the Caribbean, so we’d done it (farming) on a very small scale. 

“I actually learned to grow mushrooms by YouTube and Reddit, and mushroom forums. 

“Scotland Food and Drink, who are the industry body for Scotland, are quite excited about what we are doing. Organic gourmet mushrooms are a unique offering and an addition to the traditional Scottish farming landscape.” 

Just for the record, these aren’t just any old mushrooms, you probably won’t see them in your leading super markets any time soon either. The produce and its cultivation are centred on excellence. 

She admits that for the first six months of growing she only serviced local farmers due to not being as confident in what she was doing, but things have, er, mushroomed very with quickly with some of the UK’s finest restaurants, private chefs, nutritionists, farm shops and award juries having lauded Fuller-Armah’s product due to the remote growing conditions, unhurried and patient processes, and the care that comes with being farmed in small batches. 

Explaining more, Fuller-Armah, enthused: “The chefs seem to tell each other, which has been heartening. 

“When we started, I wasn’t even selling it to the local population, as it were, but when one chef got excited others did too. “Before any chef takes any produce on these days they actually have to come and see you, because in order to get a Michelin Star it’s about the quality of produce. 

“They don’t want to see for example that you are taking short cuts, there are some dodgy practices in agriculture. 

“When one chef came, I was like ok, this is alright. Then another came and that’s when I started thinking, maybe we are onto something here. 

“Then another came and that made us slightly more confident in the produce. They were coming and they were happy with the set up. 

“Provenance in agriculture is really important at the moment for those chefs and restaurants, they try and tell the story.” 

Winning over chefs, farmers’ markets, wholesale suppliers and the well established circuit of mushroom outlets that hold to the Deer Manor Gourmet Mushrooms standard, has been a big win for Fuller-Armah and her family. 

But some would say it pales in comparison to the undertaking they experienced when they landed in their remote part of Scotland. To put it into perspective, during the interview, 

Fuller-Armah refers to the ‘other Black family’ that she knows, living 100 miles away from her. 

The closest Caribbean restaurant is 150 miles away. Such is the remoteness of where the estate is based, before she invested in Starlink, which enables internet connectivity, tech she has used since Storm Arwen, Fuller-Armah would have to drive three miles down the road to try and get a signal via her own hotspot on a dodgy 3G network. 

She has a generator in case the electricity goes, there’s central heating now too, but that wasn’t the case when they got there. 

“We lived on the Rose Hall estate in Jamaica and when we decided to move, we wanted somewhere that had space. When you’re used to that space we found the idea of not having that space difficult. 

“We contacted realtors, told them we wanted somewhere with space that was beautiful and Scotland was more affordable than down south. 

“We were up for a renovation and was looking in Wales, Somerset, everywhere really. 

“When we came up to look at it, it was in the middle of lockdown and it was just falling apart, you couldn’t get into some of the rooms, in one room you could see the sky, but we went in

there and had a good vibe about the place. 

“Initially, we stayed in a barn conversion that a farmer had for three months while they rewired the place and put new plumbing in and they made one room habitable. Then we camped in one room while they finished. 

“It took a year to do the whole thing. The first year was awful, we didn’t have proper central heating, the carpets hadn’t gone in, I won’t dress it up, it was horrific. 

“We’d never set a fireplace up let alone learned how to position the wood so that it lasts, we had no experience of that at all. The first year was a huge learning curve. Some of the farmers around here were a big help. They were very welcoming.” 

Having survived the first year, Fuller-Armah says they installed some double glazing, made sure to insulate the building well and are generally more respectful of the bitter Scottish winter weather. Aside from one or two herds of cattle rampaging through her grounds every now and again, for the most part, things have gone excellently for her.

As mushrooms and organic foods grow in popularity, it’s safe to say that the Deer Manor Gourmet Mushrooms estate, driven by Fuller-Armah and family, will be experiencing even more growth and prosperity. 

A look at the journey so far and it’s clear to see just why she is ‘a proud Black mushroom farmer in Scotland’.

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