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Alethea's Plate 🍽

@aletheasplate

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👩🏼‍🎓🍎ANutr, Nutrition MSc
🌱seasonal, foraging & vegan food, neurodivergence chit chat & drawing some doodles✍️🌱
🌈She/Her
📩: [email protected]

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What to forage in the UK in October!🎃🍂🍄‍🟫 well and truly fungi season is HERE 😍! Along with some wild berries & nuts still around.

Pls note availability is variable year to year, weather & where abouts you are in the UK too :-) this is just a rough guide

other things in season according to my foraging books: blackthorn (sloes), blewits, coconut-scented milkcap, cow bolete & allies, curry milkcap, meadow waxcap, oak moss, scarlet waxcap & allies, snowy waxcap & sweet chestnut - among many many others!!

‼️* please familiarise yourself with foraging guidelines Forage sustainably and responsibly, and make sure you stay safe and within the law.* ‼️the woodland trust has an online page I recommend!!
#october #foraging #mushroom #mushroomforaging #seasonalliving taken in Norfolk by @aletheasplate

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13 days ago

UK Seasonal Fruit & Veg for OCTOBER 🎃
I feel like soup szn is officially here and I’m 100% here for it!!!
Full list: Aubergine, Apples, Beetroot, Blackberries, Broccoli, Brussels Sprouts, Butternut Squash, Carrots, Cauliflower, Celeriac, Celery, Chestnuts, Chicory, Chillies, Courgette, Cucumber, Elderberries, Kale, Leeks, Lettuce, Marrow, Onions, Parsnips, Pears, Peas, Potatoes, Pumpkin, Quince, Radishes, Red Cabbage, Rocket, Runner Beans, Salsify, Savoy Cabbage, Spinach, Spring Greens, Spring Onions, Summer Squash, Swede, Sweetcorn, Sweetheart Cabbage, Swiss Chard, Tomatoes, Turnips, Watercress, Wild Mushrooms, Winter Squash, White Cabbage.
#october #seasonal #seasonalfood #vegan #pumpkin #ukvegan #ukvegans #seasonalproduce taken in Norwich, Norfolk by @aletheasplate

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2 years ago

A snapshot of my first All Things Fungi Festival !🍄❤️⛺️
Scroll if ur curious what a festival about mushrooms can entail??? @allthingsfungifestival tagged all the accounts I know of & highly recommend checking them out 🍄‍🟫🫶

this is the first festival I’ve camped at in yeaaaars, I get v anxious around lots of people & crowds but this experience was wonderful; different from any other festival I’ve been to and I felt like I belonged 🥰 informative, fun, weird & wonderful!
#allthingsfungi #allthingsfungifestival #fungi #foraginguk taken in All Things Fungi Festival by @aletheasplate

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15 days ago

Spooky Species Spotlight!🔎👻 8. Ugly Milkcap aka Lactarius turpis 🤎

Now, I have a soft spot for this mushroom, it was one of the first I’d noted during the mushroom spotting walk as I was just getting into the fungi world AND I can’t help feeling a little sorry for it.. imagine ya pals are ‘Saffron Milkcap’,‘Voluminous Milkcap’, ‘Fleecy Milkcap’ and you finally get your name and it is…. The *Ugly* Milkcap 🥲

I actually rather enjoy finding the mushrooms that might be a bit gross or unsettling; the olive tones and excess guttation and ‘ugliness’ make it a perfect species for this series! So if you ever encounter one, enjoy gazing upon its gross & unsettling appearance it’s a memorable one 🥰

Aside from looks… the milk is very acrid and unpleasant and not deemed edible.

#uglymilkcap #milkcapmushroom #mushroomspotting #spookyszn #ukfungusday taken in Norwich, Norfolk by @aletheasplate

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a day ago

Spooky Species Spotlight!🔎👻 7. Weeping Widow 🖤 (Lacrymaria lacrymabunda)

‘Lacrymaria’ means ‘tears’ in Latin!
You could easily walk past this fascinating fungi as it’s creepy components lay underneath the cap.. in damp weather water droplets are stained black by the fungi and collect around the perimeter like and eye holding back tears!
Investigate the stipe and you will find the hallmark black ‘ring’ of the weeping widow 🖤

Its name and tear-like smudges are reminiscent of weeping statues found all over the globe: Parisian Cimetière du Père Lachaise, ‘magnificent seven’ cemeteries of London, Laura Daniels Fereday tomb in Utah & think modern day dr who the weeping angels villains!

#weepingwidow #ukfungusday #mushroomspotting #spookyszn #weepingangels taken in Norwich, Norfolk by @aletheasplate

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2 days ago

Spooky Species Spotlight!🔎👻 6. Porcelain fungus 🤍💧 (Oudemansiella mucida)

You’ll find on diseased/dead beech trees, ghostly pale, almost translucent! But very, very, wet & slimy 💦 advised to wipe off the cap’s slime & remove the tough stems prior to cooking 🍳 I haven’t tasted this mushie myself! But this eerie phantom fungi will haunt my plate at some point I’m sure 🍽️👻

#porcelainfungus #mushroomspotting #spookyszn #mushroomdoraging #ukfungusday taken in Felbrigg Hall, Gardens and Estate by @aletheasplate

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3 days ago

Spooky Species Spotlight!🔎👻 5. Beefsteak Fungus 🩸
(Fistulina hepatica) Perhaps my most gruesome snaps for UK Fungus day hehe soz but what a mushroom it is! Our 2nd ‘bleeding’ fungi, also known as Ox’s Tongue 👅

This bracket fungus prefers Oak the best as its host 🌳 but can also be found on chestnut sometimes.
Despite looking like a bloody slab of meat, the taste is actually rather mild and citrusy. Compared to a lot of wild mushies, it can actually be eaten raw! Carpaccio anyone? 🥩

I’ve included images of young beefsteak: the one I found bright red all over! Then more as it ages, the pores on the underside turn cream/white. I haven’t tested it but apparently the spore print is pinkish yellow🥰💗

#ukfungusday #ukfungus #beefsteak #mushroom #beefsteakfungus taken in Norwich, Norfolk by @aletheasplate

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4 days ago

Spooky Species Spotlight!🔎👻 4. Candlesnuff Fungus 🕯️ (Xylaria hypoxylon)

Differing itself from Dead Man’s Fingers, Candlesnuff is flatter and heavily branches giving the effect of deer’s antlers! You might also hear of it being called ‘Stag’s Horn’.

Their powdery white tips are quite fun to flick at and see the the dusty spores take flight, similar looking to snuffing out the wick of a candle 🕯️

Now this very common fungi has a hidden secret as the darkest of night falls… it’s eerie yet beautiful bioluminescence !✨ however it is so faint you’d need a long exposure camera to capture it. The final image shows its biofluorescence (reflection of UV light).

#mushroomspotting #spookyszn #candlesnuff #xylaria #fungilove taken in Norfolk by @aletheasplate

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7 days ago

Spooky Species Spotlight!🔎👻 3. Dead Man’s Fingers 🧟‍♂️ (Xylaria polymopha)
Look out for clusters of warty swollen fingers erupting from rotting wood (especially beech trees).

This very common fungi is not poisonous but also not considered edible given their tough woody texture & lack of taste.
They are saprobic fungi, playing an important role in breaking down tough polysaccharides from the tree and leaving nutrient rich debris for invertebrates to eat! An essential part to the woodland floors 🥰🧟‍♂️ kind but creepy!

Its closest look alike is Dead Moll’s Fingers (Xylaria longipes). Presenting very similarly except is slimmer, and notably shorter with a smaller base. They also most frequently use sycamore as their host plant. Honestly some of these photos could be this species but all are under Xylaria :-)
There is also a candlesnuff fungus (also under Xylaria genus) I’ll be covering in an upcoming post.

#deadmansfingers #spookyfungi #spookyszn #mushroomspotting #Xylariapolymopha taken in Norfolk by @aletheasplate

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9 days ago

Spooky Species Spotlight!🔎👻 2. Fly Agaric 🍄
We know her, we love her. Perhaps THE most recognisable mushie out there. Rife with deep folklore roots, many of which relating to its psychoactive qualities! 🌀

I love a fly agaric, the gills sometimes looking as thick and textured as book pages. Locals to Norwich may recognise the UEA campus - they grow on the grassy patches inbetween the Sainsburys Centre & Constable Terrace Halls 🍄❣️

Whilst poisonous to humans, they are rarely deadly. As it turns out, Reindeer enjoy having a little snack on a fly agaric; as they digest the mushroom their body filters out more harmful components and the hallucinogenic qualities are excreted in their urine unaltered. 🍄
Shaman and indigenous peoples of Siberia and Lapland discovered that drinking the urine of reindeer that had eaten the mushroom, they could experience the hallucinogenic qualities without the severe physical sickness from eating them raw.

#flyagaric #mushroomhunting #uea #norwich #spookyszn taken in Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, University of East Anglia by @aletheasplate

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10 days ago

Spooky Species Spotlight!🔎👻 1. Bleeding Fairy Helmet 🧚🩸 Mycena haematopus: Also referred to as burgundy drop bonnet or the mushroom that ‘bleeds’ 😱
Well… despite how gory it may look, the liquid is actually a red latex fluid that oozes out whenever the cap or stem is damaged 🩸 another fun fact is they have a small amount of bioluminescence! (That’s glowing without the need of a UV torch!) even spookier 👻

Check the last photo for how they look undamaged! You’re looking for a definite warmth of colour to them, I found these ones before I even knew they were bleeding bonnets!

#spookyszn #fairymushroom #fungi #spookyfungi #mushroomspotting by @aletheasplate

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11 days ago