Magic truffle varieties: what changes between the names?

A truffle shelf can read like the server list of a fantasy game: Mexicana, Mokum, Pandora, Utopia, Hollandia, Valhalla. It's tempting to treat the names like a ladder, with a friendly bottom rung and something mythic at the top. So what do the names actually mean, and how much does the ladder tell you?

Strain names turn out to be a mix of three things. Some are species names a mycologist gave a fungus. Some are trade names a grower or shop chose. And the strength words that go with them ("mild", "strong", "our strongest") are each shop's own scale. Only the first kind has a scientific meaning, and the published measurements of psilocybin in truffles are too sparse to back up a ranking of the rest.

Before you pick a name off the shelf

• Names come in three kinds. Species names (Psilocybe mexicana, P. tampanensis, P. atlantis), trade or cultivar names (Pandora, Hollandia, Valhalla and others) and shop-defined strength labels. They look alike on a pack and mean very different things.
• Two shops' ladders don't line up. On 8 October 2026, Mush Magic and Azarius agreed on the extremes (Mexicana mild; Hollandia, Utopia and Valhalla strong) and disagreed on several in the middle, including Mokum and Atlantis.
• Shop pages disagree about identity too. Species labels for some names differ between and within shops, and one reference work suggests that the species name "galindoi" itself is tangled.
• Published potency data for truffles is thin. Only one peer-reviewed measurement of commercially sold sclerotia turned up, and no study compares named varieties side by side (details below).
• A pack's weight isn't its psilocybin content. Different packs of the same named variety may differ.
• The legal picture, in one line. Fresh truffles are sold legally in the Netherlands, mushrooms are prohibited and dried truffles are disputed between sources (read on 8 October 2026; see the Netherlands section). That's a Dutch position, not an EU-wide one.

What's a "magic truffle", anyway?

Not a culinary truffle. Magic truffles are sclerotia: dense, underground masses of fungal tissue that certain Psilocybe species form, commonly called "magic truffles" in a 2013 analysis of them. They contain psilocybin, the same compound found in psilocybin mushrooms, which are the fruiting bodies of related fungi. The legal difference between the two in the Netherlands is covered below.

Three kinds of names on one shelf

Here are the names listed by Mush Magic, Azarius and Zamnesia on their public pages on 8 October 2026, and what those pages say about them. These are supplier descriptions, reported as claims; we haven't tested the products.

• Name: Mexicana; What kind of name it looks like: A species name used as a variety name; What the shop pages say: Mush Magic: "Psilocybe Mexicana", "of mild strength". Azarius: P. mexicana
• Name: Tampanensis; What kind of name it looks like: A species name used as a variety name; What the shop pages say: Azarius: P. tampanensis. Mush Magic: "AKA 'philosopher's stones'"
• Name: Atlantis; What kind of name it looks like: A species name used as a variety name; What the shop pages say: Azarius lists P. atlantis among its truffle species. Mush Magic's page says it's "cultivated from a rare species of Psilocybe cubensis"
• Name: Mokum; What kind of name it looks like: Trade name; What the shop pages say: Azarius: a P. mexicana variety. Mush Magic's navigation lists it as "Psilocybe mokum", with no species statement in the description
• Name: Pajaritos; What kind of name it looks like: Trade name; What the shop pages say: Neither Mush Magic's description nor Azarius's shop page states a species
• Name: Fantasia; What kind of name it looks like: Trade name; What the shop pages say: Mush Magic: "Psilocybe cubensis sclerotia"
• Name: Pandora; What kind of name it looks like: Trade name; What the shop pages say: Mush Magic: "developed by MushMagic" as a "slightly weaker (but still very strong) version of the Hollandia truffle"
• Name: Hollandia, Utopia, Valhalla; What kind of name it looks like: Trade names; What the shop pages say: Mush Magic's navigation lists each as "Psilocybe" plus the name. Azarius gives no species. An Azarius wiki page says such names are "partly commercial branding rather than strict mycological classification"

Azarius's shop page also lists six third-party products from another brand (High Hawaiians, SugaShrooms, MushRocks, Pink Paradise, Dragon's Dynamite, Sex on the Beach), with no species given. Zamnesia's truffle page says it offers fresh varieties "from the gentle Mexicana to the potent Valhalla".

None of this is unusual for products named by growers. "Psilocybe Hollandia" looks like a species name, but it isn't listed as one in the species entries below. The formal fungal name registers weren't searched, so read that as "no sign of it", not proof.

The species names: what's behind the Latin

Four species names come up most. The descriptions that follow come from Wikipedia's species entries, which cite the original taxonomic papers; treat them as orientation rather than a taxonomy ruling.

• *Psilocybe mexicana* was described by the French mycologist Roger Heim in the 1950s, according to Wikipedia's summary, and can form sclerotia.
• *Psilocybe tampanensis* was described by Gastón Guzmán and Steven Pollock in 1978 from a collection near Tampa, Florida, per Wikipedia. It's the source of the "philosopher's stones" nickname.
• *Psilocybe atlantis* was described by Guzmán and colleagues from a collection in Georgia, USA, per Wikipedia.
• *Psilocybe galindoi* is the odd one. Wikipedia's entry notes that material sold under this name in Western cultivation has been reported as misidentified P. tampanensis, and that the genuine P. galindoi is considered a synonym of P. mexicana.

The galindoi point comes from that single reference work, so treat it as "unsettled" rather than established. But it shows the problem: when a name on a pack can be argued over by the people who study the fungus, the name alone isn't a precise description of what's in the pack. Researchers have used the name too: the Marschall 2022 trial describes its dried truffles as Galindoi truffles. A name in a paper is still a label, not a verified identification.

Strength ladders: two shops, one staircase, different landings

Both shops describe their truffles on a ladder. Here are the words each one used on 8 October 2026. The Azarius column is the tier from its truffle category page; the Mush Magic column quotes its product descriptions.

• Name: Mexicana; Azarius tier: Mild; Mush Magic description: "Of mild strength"
• Name: Pajaritos; Azarius tier: Mild; Mush Magic description: "a thoughtful strain", with no strength word
• Name: Mokum; Azarius tier: Mild; Mush Magic description: "despite the unique effects, these are strong truffles"
• Name: Tampanensis; Azarius tier: Medium; Mush Magic description: "strong visual effects and deep, philosophical thoughts" (no tier word)
• Name: Fantasia; Azarius tier: Medium; Mush Magic description: "Friendly and of moderate strength"
• Name: Atlantis; Azarius tier: Medium; Mush Magic description: "one of the strongest strains of magic truffles available"
• Name: Pandora; Azarius tier: Medium; Mush Magic description: "a slightly weaker (but still very strong) version" of Hollandia
• Name: Hollandia; Azarius tier: Strong; Mush Magic description: "among the strongest available"
• Name: Utopia; Azarius tier: Strong; Mush Magic description: "take second place, alongside Hollandia, as our strongest"
• Name: Valhalla; Azarius tier: Strong; Mush Magic description: "our absolute strongest"

At the ends, the shops agree. In the middle they don't: Mokum is mild at one shop and "strong" at the other, and Atlantis is "medium" at one and "one of the strongest" at the other. That doesn't mean either shop is wrong. Each ladder is a ranking inside one shop's own range, set by whoever wrote the page, and a "strong" for one shop's range isn't a unit. It also means you can't carry a ladder from one shop to another.

Azarius's shop page goes further and attaches psilocybin ranges to its tiers: roughly 0.4 to 0.7% of dry weight for mild, 0.7 to 1.0% for medium and 1.0 to 1.5% for strong. Ask what a number like that comes from: fresh-weight, dry-weight and percentage figures aren't interchangeable, and shop explainers are written to help customers choose, not to be peer-reviewed.

What published analyses show (and don't)

Here's the published evidence as of 8 October 2026, from a search of Europe PMC and the web.

• Pellegrini et al. (2013) developed a method for measuring psilocybin and psilocin in sclerotia and applied it to Psilocybe sclerotia. It found only psilocybin, at 59.3 to 167.8 µg per 100 mg of fresh sclerotia. That's roughly 0.06 to 0.17% of fresh weight, or about 0.6 to 1.7 mg per gram. The abstract doesn't say which varieties were tested or how many samples.
• The Marschall 2022 trial analysed the dried truffles it gave participants and reported an alkaloid concentration of about 2,129 µg/g, or around 1.5 mg in a 0.7 g dried dose. It was one batch, measured for a trial.
• Fresh and dried figures use different bases, which is why the two results above can't be compared directly. Many shop ranges use "% dry weight" while packs are sold fresh, so a percentage on a page isn't a number you can multiply by a pack's weight without knowing the water content.
• Variation can be large even under controlled conditions. In a 2026 analysis of 14 Psilocybe cubensis mushroom strains grown identically, total tryptamines varied more than 7.8-fold between strains, and psilocybin varied between individual fruiting bodies of the same strain. These were mushrooms, not truffles, so it shows what's possible. It doesn't describe commercial truffles.

What the search didn't turn up: a published, peer-reviewed analysis comparing named commercial truffle varieties side by side, or one that tests whether a variety's name predicts its psilocybin content or its effects. Azarius's wiki says something similar itself: that analytically, controlled comparisons holding dose constant and varying only the variety are still awaited. That's an honest statement, and it's the current position.

Reading a truffle pack like a detective with a very small magnifying glass

Here's how to read a pack page, using the pages above as the example. The answers below are what those pages state.

• Question: Which variety is it?; What the shop pages gave: A name, on every product
• Question: Which species is it?; What the shop pages gave: Sometimes stated (Azarius for Mexicana, Tampanensis, Atlantis, Mokum), sometimes not, and sometimes in conflict with other references (see above)
• Question: How much is in the pack?; What the shop pages gave: Mush Magic: 15 g, vacuum-packed. Azarius describes a standard pack as 15 g
• Question: How much psilocybin per gram?; What the shop pages gave: Azarius gives tier ranges; Mush Magic's pages give none. Neither shop linked a laboratory report
• Question: How long does it keep?; What the shop pages gave: Mush Magic's truffle page says "up to 3 months" in one place and "2 months" in another. Azarius says 2 to 3 months refrigerated at 2 to 4°C. The date on your pack is the one that counts
• Question: Is it tested?; What the shop pages gave: Neither shop's pages carried a test report

Three habits follow from that:

1. Read the name as a label, not a measurement. If a page claims a species, check whether it also tells you where that identification came from.
2. Treat percentages and "strong" as the shop's claims. They become information when there's a named method, sample and batch.
3. Compare like with like. Fresh weight, dried weight and percentage of dry weight are different things.

The Netherlands: what's legal as of 8 October 2026

• The statute. The Opium Act text (read on wetten.overheid.nl on 8 October 2026) puts psilocine and psilocybine on List I and "Paddo's A", mushrooms that naturally contain them, on List II. It doesn't name truffles or sclerotia.
• Fresh psilocybin truffles (sclerotia) are sold legally in Dutch smartshops. Jellinek (page version January 2021) says selling fresh sclerotia isn't prohibited and they're sold in smartshops. Trimbos's DRUGSinfo says truffles aren't mushrooms and so fall outside the Opium Act, and Drugs en Uitgaan says the same. Another Jellinek page adds that fresh truffles fall under the Warenwet (Commodities Act).
• Mushrooms, fresh or dried, are on List II and have been prohibited since December 2008.
• Dried truffles are where the sources part ways. Jellinek says dried truffles fall under List I. DRUGSinfo and Drugs en Uitgaan say truffles aren't covered and don't mention drying. We can't settle that for you, so this page doesn't call dried truffles either legal or banned.
• Recent law changes: a ban on certain designer-drug groups took effect on 1 July 2025. The government's page on it doesn't mention truffles. Nothing we found changes the truffle position; check the official wording for the current text.

Laws change, so check the current rules before relying on any of this. Other countries may treat truffles differently (other EU countries weren't checked for this page). A shop saying it ships "where permitted" is the shop's statement, not a legal clearance. Jellinek also says driving after use is prohibited.

Safety and support

The NCCIH says the experience depends on how much psilocybin someone takes and on their personality, mood, expectations and surroundings, and lists the type of mushroom and prior experience among the factors, together with combined use with other drugs. It lists possible adverse effects including raised blood pressure and heart rate, nausea, anxiety, paranoia and hallucinations, and says psilocybin isn't safe for people with psychotic conditions such as schizophrenia or severe forms of bipolar disorder. It also notes research is under way on interactions with conventional medicines, including SSRIs.

The practical takeaway here is narrower: a variety's name or a shop's strength word isn't a reliable guide to how strong a given pack will be, and it's no substitute for advice from a doctor, pharmacist or Dutch harm-reduction service. Jellinek and Trimbos publish information in Dutch, and if you or someone else is in distress after using, contact a doctor or emergency services.

So what actually changes between the names?

• Species, where it's stated and correct, is a real difference, though researchers disagree about some names, and the differences in published potency data between species aren't well established.
• Trade names tell you which grower or shop sold it, which is useful for finding the same product again.
• Strength words tell you where the shop thinks it sits in its own range. They don't transfer between shops.
• Psilocybin content is the number that matters and the one a pack rarely states. Without a lab report, a ladder is an estimate.

Where to read next

A name on the pack is only the start. These guides pick up the questions that come next.

• What to expect from magic truffles, for the timing, why the same pack differs between people, difficult moments and who should skip them.
• Truffle safety, difficult experiences and getting support, for who should avoid psilocybin, what difficult experiences look like and the Dutch help options.
• Microdosing products and protocols explained, for what truffle microdosing packs contain, where the Fadiman and Stamets schedules came from and what controlled trials have tested.
• Microdosing: the idea, the research and the reality, for what placebo-controlled psilocybin microdosing studies measured and why expectation muddies the results.

Written by Smart Supplements with AI assistance from the sources linked in the text. It has not been reviewed by a clinician.

Last updated: 12 October 2026

This article is for informational purposes only and is not intended as medical advice. Always consult a healthcare professional before starting any new supplement, especially if you take prescription medication.