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Alissa Allen

@mycopigments

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Alissa Allen got her start in the Pacific Northwest and has been sharing her passion for fungi for over 20 years.

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Just floored (as usual) by the range and quality of colors pulled from the mushrooms our MyColores group pulled from the forest just this last week. With rainy season fully in action in Chiapas, the sheer volume of incredible Dye mushrooms has been overwhelming… both for our baskets and the back-up of waiting trays for the 24/7 dehydrator! So many thanks to the incredible knowledge of Maestra Alissa Allen (@mycopigments)… her expertise and teaching prowess if unparalleled!

The most magical of these, of course, is the incredible ammonia-ferment brew of Teloschistes sp, a lichen that dyes pink, but changes to blue in the UV sunlight! The pink in the video herein became the blue on the rack!

For Day 2, we are anticipating blues and greens from Hydnellum con crescents and Phellodon niger, purple from the long sought-after Hapalopilus, a mushroom that came to us from Bruch Reed (@bruchreed) who was secretly collection it for Kim (@thisiskimqi) for the last two years!

Just stunning, this magical art form of mushroom dyes!

#mexico #mushroom #dyeing adventure #chiapas

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First foray day of MyColores with @the_fungivore and what a colorful day filled with dyers corts and cat cuddles. The walk was beautiful with a nourishing lunch and detailed fungi table talk with Ezequiel (@_fungaria_) and Alissa (@mycopigments) to kick off our week of mushroom foraging and natural dyeing in Chiapas. I can’t wait to see the rainbow we will make later this week!!!

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MyColores first day kicked off with a walking tour of San Cristobal to get our footing for a week in this beautiful town. One of many highlights was a special visit with Sergio Castro and his private museum of regional dress and artifacts - a beautiful introduction to the diversity of Mayan culture, language and dress here in Chiapas. At 88, every visit with Sergio is a window into a different world and also support his work to treat local burn victims.

Enjoy this beautiful compilation from the group’s favorite photos - the art, architecture, animals, and all!! Tomorrow we are off to the forest for our first day of foraging for dye mushrooms to make our rainbow later this week! Mushlove!

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Just over a week ago, we took our MycoChiapas group up to Huitepec, the ancient water volcano that towers above the Chiapas highlands, to explore the fungi there. Though we didn’t leave with a ton of any one thing, we didn’t manage to pull 133 species out of the duff and dirt in our 4 hour exploration! Check out the last two photos for a teaser of what we found (the formatting cut off some of the image, sorry!!).

Today, we head back up the mountain with our MyColores mushroom dye group! I cannot wait to see what has changed, what has grown, and what else we find with our guide and mycologist Ezequiel Cruz, Msc. to see what we find just a little over a week of rain later!! Stay tuned!

#mexico #mushroom #foraging #adventure #chiapas

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We kicked off our first MyColores in Chiapas last night with an epic group of ladies, and a couple of Mushroom(dye)-adjacent partners with one of the best meals in the city: Tarumba (@tarumba.mx) and a simply gorgeous and delicious display of traditional ingredients reimagined, from hard-shell duck tacos to an over-the-top local cheese plate, cocktails with mumo and zucú (otherwise known as Hoja Santa and Chicatanaas!), delicious fish dishes at 7200ft elevation… wow.🤩

We are so excited to be hosting Alissa Allen for her 5th year in a row in Mexico to explore the mycopigments of chiapas (@mycopigments).

Life is better when it is delicious AND colorful! #mexico #mushroom #foraging #adventure #chiapas

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This woman always knocks it out of the park! Alissa Allen is amazing!
From collecting yesterday to beginning our dye extraction today!🌥️🍄‍🟫🌥️
#whidbeyisland #mushroomdyes #naturaldyes #craftclasses

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Alissa Allen @mycopigments is back with her vast knowledge of mushrooms & lichens
A foraging walk resulted in some dye treasures!
#whidbeyisland #mushroomdyes #naturaldyes #fiberart #fieldtrip

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Day 6: Part 2 - The Micro-Mico-Fest

MyComida: Rupestre, always our first Myco adventure of the year, has proven itself to be the model for these efforts, culminating now for its 4th year in our MicroMicoFest, our small mushroom festival that we put on in Spanish for our host community, complete with mushroom cooking and mushroom dyeing demos, a library of mycology books in Spanish out for perusal (it is out all three days we are there), and a mushroom ID table where El Carrizal can take in the edible, medicinal, toxic, and dye mushrooms of the forests in which they so graciously allow us to frolick. The feedback we receive each year is always enthusiastic.

This year, Chef Chad Hyatt made a fantastic paella pan Spanish seafood rice, but with shrimp Russula and lobster mushrooms; Zack made a cured lemon Bolognese with porcini, macrolepiota and the edible skirted Cort (C. caperatus). Sorry… what recipes?

Meanwhile, despite our focus being primarily on the edibles of the early season, Kim was able to run dye baths for 7 mushrooms (and Usnea) each, changed the color with pH, and probably blew the most minds at the faire with the sheer range of color she pulled from our few days of foraging. Just amazing. Interested? There’s still space on MyColores in Chiapas!

And wouldn’t that be easy if that were the end, but our final day with our hosts Delila, her father Abraham and husband/ barbacoa maestra Ramon (and their adult kids Kimberly and Ramon, Jr., of course!) is the culmination of a temporary family and a shared meal that acts more as a ceremony than simply eating. What a surprise to feel at home so far from where we were raised. We will miss this place until next time!

If any one part of this adventure sounds like your speed, get on the Trip list for 2027 in the bio-link or at thefungivore.com!

#oaxaca #mushroom #foraging #Adventure #micofest

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Y is for Yellow Stagshorn Fungus, Yucca Flowers, and Yellow Jackets Wasps! 🍄‍🟫🌸🐝 I’ve created a botanical alphabet coloring book where each letter is represent by a mushroom, flower, and insect!
Comment a letter you want to see below and I’ll send it to you! 🤗
🔤🍄‍🟫🍄🌸🌺🐝🐛🦋🔤
#educationalbooks #coloringbook #learnsomethingnew #botanical
#colormehappy

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Day 1: Monte Alban

And they’re off! Departing our hotel a little earlier than usual, our group of mushroom enthusiasts set off for our first full day!

First stop, Monte Alban, the ancient Zapotec city that is considered the oldest city in Mesoamérica founded around 500BC and continuously occupied for the next 1400 years! This may be our 15th (or greater) trip to this archeological site, and every time we learn something new, and marvel at the engineering all over again.

Switching it up this year, we made a quantum leap from the Oaxaca valley to 10,000ft for lunch with the gracious family hosts of Casa del Piedra for a delicious lunch of Mole Chichillo of Caesar Amanitas, the local mushroom seen in the first photo here being held by Zack.

From there we wound our way another 20km into the Sierra nortes to the adobe cabins of the small community of San Isidro Llano Grande where we will stay for the next three nights. To our surprise, passing through Cuajimoloyas, the host of the longest running mushroom festival in Mexico, we found Marta Contreras and an array of edible fungi that let us know we were in for a treat this week..!

Upon arrival at the ecotourism center, our guest didn’t waste anytime, wondering only 100m from the cabins and returning with copious species of Amanita, phaeocollybia, the edible Cortinarius caperatus (aka Gypsies), and some choice porcini… just a preview of what we expect to be finding during our first full day of foraging and cooking!

A dinner of Tlayudas and perfectly spiced salsa, we all went to be with visions of porcini dancing in our heads!

#oaxaca #llanogrqnde #SierraNorte #mushroom #foraging

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Curious about natural dyeing with mushrooms? 6 great books about dyeing with mushrooms. The Rainbow Beneath My Feet includes identification and step-by-step instructions. Magic in the Dyepot is about dyeing with mushrooms in the temperate rainforests on the West Coast of British Columbia. Mushroom Color Atlas includes instructions and illustrations for dyeing with more than two dozen mushroom species. Mushrooms for Dyes, Paper, Pigments & Myco-Stix details the history, development and science of mushroom arts. Journeys in Natural Dyeing shares travels to 4 countries and visits with natural dyers to inspire connecting with your own natural environment to create colour. True Colors: World Masters of Natural Dyes and Pigments is about artists who create color from natural materials and about the historical importance and environmental sustainability of this practice.

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