{"id":112,"date":"2011-01-06T12:05:41","date_gmt":"2011-01-06T16:05:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/santacruzfoodie.com\/?p=112"},"modified":"2011-06-12T19:10:15","modified_gmt":"2011-06-12T23:10:15","slug":"mushroom-cooking-demos-kids-activities-more-at-santa-cruz-fungus-fair","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/santacruzfoodie.com\/?p=112","title":{"rendered":"Mushroom cooking demos, kids activities, more at Santa Cruz Fungus Fair"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

An intrigued young attendee at Santa Cruz Fungus Fair<\/p><\/div>\n

If you\u2019re a mushroom fan, don\u2019t miss the 37th<\/sup> Annual Santa Cruz Fungus Fair<\/a> this weekend where you can watch cooking demos, get recipes, and hear experts at Louden Nelson Community Center in downtown Santa Cruz. Prices and fair hours can be found at the end of this article.<\/p>\n

The event is so popular that this year it\u2019s been expanded from two days to three days, beginning on Friday afternoon instead of Saturday morning. It features lots of great food from various vendors; last year selections included mushroom lasagna, cheesecake with candycap mushroom glaze, and India Joze<\/a> Thai 3-mushroom soup (I had one delectable $4 bowl and could have eaten so much more!). Plus, the festival has many informative displays where you can learn more than you ever thought possible about mushrooms. A special habitat display area, beautifully arranged, will showcase hundreds of mushroom species commonly found in the Santa Cruz\/San Francisco\/Monterey Bay area.<\/p>\n

The fair is hosted by the Fungus Federation of Santa Cruz<\/a>, a non-profit organization that aims to expand the understanding and appreciation of mycology (study of mushrooms) and to assist the general public, related institutions, and societies to further this goal. Its biggest event is the annual Fungus Fair.<\/p>\n

MUSHROOM COOKING DEMO INFO:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Friday, January 7 6-7pm: Oswald<\/a> Chef\/Co-Owner Damani Thomas will do a demo and talk on opening night of this year\u2019s festival. He is an incredible chef and this is bound to be an engaging, informative program. Read more<\/a> about Oswald, including the popular downtown Santa Cruz restaurant\u2019s three-course fixed-price Wednesday evening meals.<\/p>\n

Saturday, January 8 3-4:30pm: Chef Todd Spanier, who runs a business gathering \u201cwild foods\u201d including mushrooms and huckleberries, and getting them into markets and restaurants \u2013 including getting his morels into Chez Panisse. Read more about Spanier at the Fungus Fair web site\u2019s program\/speaker section<\/a><\/a>.<\/p>\n

Sunday January 9 3-4:30pm: Jozseph Schultz (founder\/chef of restaurant India Joze) is doing a demo and audience members will get to taste samples. Schultz\u2019s travels include Bali and Turkey, and he is a talented cook and storyteller. Here are some of his recipes<\/a>; he\u2019s authored cookbooks such as \u201cIndia Joze International Mushroom Cookbook.\u201d In addition to running India Joze (read more <\/a>on this fabulous restaurant), Schultz teaches many classes including ones at local New Leaf Market<\/a> and UC Santa Cruz.<\/p>\n

Other fungus fair highlights include mushroom identification (bring your own and have experts tell you details!), vendors<\/a> selling mushroom-related books, jewelry, and ceramics, and lectures by individuals such as Fungus Fair founder \/ mycologist \/ author\u00a0 David Arora — see complete schedule<\/a> — plus a Kids Room with hands-on activities such as making clay mushrooms and dying fabric with mushroom dyes. Arora\u2019s most recent publication was as a major contributor to a special ethnomycological issue of Economic Botany, a journal published by the New York Botanical Garden. His interests range from mushroom harvest and usage around the world to mushroom ecology, taxonomy, cuisine, foraging culture and storytelling. All of these subjects will likely be covered during presentations entitled “The Wheel of Fungi” (11am-12:30 Saturday, 1-2:30 Sunday). The Saturday and Sunday presentations have the same title but will not cover the same material. Arora says of them: “Without giving too much away, I will be giving something away.”<\/p>\n

One of last year\u2019s culinary demo guests was wild-mushroom chef\/Oregon restaurateur Jack Czarnecki, and I really enjoyed his presentation. Read more about Czarnecki and his 2010 Fair appearance here<\/a> — includes cooking tips. Get Czarnecki\u2019s recipe<\/a> for salmon cakes with mushrooms and truffle mayonnaise<\/p>\n

See all you mushroom lovers this weekend!<\/p>\n

On Twitter? Follow me @santacruzfoodie<\/a>.<\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Details:<\/strong><\/p>\n

4-7pm Friday January 7; 10am-5pm Saturday & Sunday January 8-9<\/p>\n

Call (831) 684-2275 for more information or see fair site <\/a><\/p>\n

Admission: Friday $5 for everyone<\/p>\n

Saturday-Sunday – $7 Adults, $5 Seniors & Students, free for kids under 12<\/p>\n

Louden Nelson Community Center, 301 Center Street (at corner of Laurel) \u2013 some street parking available at center; another option is further down Center Street near the police station<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you\u2019re a mushroom fan, don\u2019t miss the 37th Annual Santa Cruz Fungus Fair this weekend where you can watch cooking demos, get recipes, and hear experts at Louden Nelson Community Center in downtown Santa Cruz. Prices and fair hours … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20,33],"tags":[44,42,70,71,7,69],"class_list":["post-112","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cooking-chefs","category-events","tag-chefs","tag-cooking","tag-india-joze","tag-oswald","tag-santa-cruz","tag-santa-cruz-fungus-fair"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/santacruzfoodie.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/santacruzfoodie.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/santacruzfoodie.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/santacruzfoodie.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/santacruzfoodie.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=112"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/santacruzfoodie.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":335,"href":"https:\/\/santacruzfoodie.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112\/revisions\/335"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/santacruzfoodie.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=112"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/santacruzfoodie.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=112"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/santacruzfoodie.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=112"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}