Today on the Mushroom Hour Podcast we are joined by Maria Finn, founder of Flora and Fungi wild foods. Maria Finn is an author, journalist, chef and multi-sensory storyteller. She spent many years pursuing obsessions, like tango dancing and surfing by working on fishing boats in Alaska. Prior to COVID lockdown, she was chef-in-residence for Stochastic Labs, a residency for artists, scientists and tech innovators in Berkeley. During the pandemic she launched Flora and Fungi Wild Food Adventures where she teaches people how to hunt for porcinis, chanterelles, seaweed and other wild foods. She has published widely, including essays, articles, and books, some of which have been optioned for television, inducing visions of grandeur that have not yet come to fruition. She was an ocean faring cat lady living on a houseboat in Sausalito with her two tabby cats and native oyster garden. During COVID lockdown, she adopted a truffle puppy and has since spent many hours is in the woods training her to find these buried gems along with other edible fungi; she has spent subsequent hours searching her dog and self for ticks. She is working on a book about truffles around their world – their role in forest ecosystems and our co-evolution with them!   

TOPICS COVERED:   

• Writing, Food and the Ocean Collide   
• Listening to Nature & Understanding Cycles   
• Learning from the Yupik Peoples   
• Magic of Cooking Wild Food Around a Campfire   
• Becoming a Wild Food Educator   
• Discovering the Magic of Truffles   
• Falling in Love with Lagotto Ramagnolo   
• Learning to Tango with Your Truffle Dog    
• Mentors in Mushroom & Truffle Hunting   
• Coevolution of Truffles & Humans   
• Human Bodies as Fractals of our Planet   
• Truffle Renaissance   
• Democratization of Pleasure   
• Developing New Value Systems   

EPISODE RESOURCES:   

• Maria Finn Website: http://www.mariafinn.com/   
• Flora & Fungi Adventures: https://www.floraandfungiadventures.com/   
• Maria Finn IG: https://www.instagram.com/maria_finn1/   
• Yupik peoples: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yupik_peoples   
• Mycological Society of Marin: https://www.mycomarin.org/   
• Lagotto Romagnolo: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lagotto_Romagnolo   
• The Truffle Dog Company: https://truffledogcompany.com/   
• "Scent and the Scenting Dog" (Book): https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/862416.Scent_and_the_Scenting_Dog   
• Tuber lyonii (Truffle): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pecan_truffle   
• Craterellus cornucopioides (Fungus): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craterellus_cornucopioides