There are about 15,000 kinds of mushrooms found worldwide and 2,000 kinds of edible mushrooms. There are about 1,500 kinds of mushrooms native to Korea, among which about 300 kinds of edible mushrooms are counted. In Korea, mainly Lentinus edodes (shiitake mushroom), Tricholoma matsutake (pine mushroom), and Sarcodon aspratus (Neungi mushroom) are edible, and they are imported from China due to insufficient production. The purpose of this study was to compare the nutritional quality of Chinese and Korean frozen Tricholoma matsutake and Sarcodon aspratus. The crude fat content of frozen Tricholoma matsutake was 1.1 ~ 1.5% in Chinese and 0.5% in Korea. Korea products were lower than Chinese ones. The content of crude protein in Chinese was 16.4 ~ 20.9% and that of Korea was 21.2%. In crude ash content, there are some differences between regions. The crude protein content of frozen Sarcodon aspratus was 18.9% in Chinese and 19.4% in Korea. The crude fat content was 1.2% in Chinese and 0.9% in Korea. There was no significant difference in the contents of crude ash.

The world mushroom market is continuously expanding due to the improvement of production technology and the continuous increase of demand. Production and consumption of mushrooms are increasing in Korea and imports are increasing year by year. Most of the imported mushrooms are from China. The Lentinus edodes (shiitake mushroom) are in dry form, but Tricholoma matsutake (pine mushroom) and Sarcodon aspratus (Neungi mushroom) are imported in frozen form. It is suspected that frozen Tricholoma matsutake and Sarcodon aspratus are coated with water to increase the weight excessively. In this study, we compared the moisture content and drip% of Chinese and Korean frozen Tricholoma matsutake and Sarcodon aspratus to determine the presence or absence of water coating. The moisture content of frozen Tricholoma matsutake was highest in Yunnan (China) at 94.7%, followed by Tibetan (China) at 92.5%, Yanji (China) at 90.6% and Korea at 88.5%. The moisture content of frozen Sarcodon aspratus was 92.4% in China and 91.6% in Korea. The drip% of frozen Tricholoma matsutake was 23.1% in Tibetan (China), 22.1% in Yunnan (China), 14.5% in Yanji (China) and 11.7% in Korea. The amount of drip% of Korea and Chinese frozen Sarcodon aspratus was 20.8% and 22.7%, respectively. Moisture content and drip% of frozen Sarcodon aspratus were similar to those of Chinese and Korea. Frozen Tricholoma matsutake imported from China showed high moisture content and drip% than Korea ones. These results indicated that water coating is possible in frozen Tricholoma matsutake imported from China.