Three hours in the November woods, then an hour tasting what we found.
November 1–14, in the area surrounding Elk, with Jérôme. We meet at the Elk Cove Inn and leave at 9:00 am sharp, drive out together, and are back by 1:00 pm — with one exception: Saturday 7 November meets at Harvest Market in Mendocino at 10:30 am and has only 4 places. Choose it below and the details appear. We finish with a tasting and a light mushroom-based snack, made in partnership with Chef Victor Passalacqua of Sibo, the Elk Cove Inn restaurant.
$120 per guest, a Mushroom Month price for Inn guests (our regular Intermediate Foray is $140). Already included in the bundle you booked with the Inn — there is nothing to pay here.
No allergy or dietary accommodation. The tasting and the snack are a fixed menu and cannot be adapted. If you have a food allergy or a restricted diet, this foray is not the right fit.
A harvest is never guaranteed. This is a wild foray: what we find depends entirely on the conditions on the day. Some mornings the baskets come back full, some mornings they don't. What you are booking is the experience — the hunt, the teaching and the tasting — not a quantity of mushrooms.
You need a CAL FIRE mushroom permit — apply today, not the week before.
Some of the public forest we may use is Jackson Demonstration State Forest, and CAL FIRE requires every
person picking mushrooms there to carry their own permit. It is $20, it runs to 30 June whichever month you
buy it, and it is mail only: print the form, post it with a check or money order and a stamped
self-addressed envelope, and it comes back to you in the post.
CAL FIRE asks you to allow 10 to 14 days.
The form is on CAL FIRE's Jackson State Forest page, under Mushroom Permit Information.
If it will not reach you before your morning, tell me. I choose the ground on the day according to
conditions, and I will put your foray somewhere we can legally pick —
email me rather than
turn up without it.
1 · RANK THREE MORNINGS
Your first choice is required. Second and third give us room to place you.
Saturday 7 November is different — read this before you choose it.
That morning we meet at Harvest Market at Mendosa's, 10501 Lansing St, Mendocino,
and leave at 10:30 am sharp — not at the Elk Cove Inn, and not at 9:00. We are back by
2:30 pm. It is the same foray at the same $120, and there are only
4 places on it, because the day is shared with guests booking elsewhere.
That day runs whatever happens, so you are confirmed as soon as you are placed on it.
A CAL FIRE permit is mandatory on this day — this is the one morning where it is not optional.
7 November goes onto Jackson Demonstration State Forest, where every person picking mushrooms
must carry their own permit. It is $20 and mail only. The form is on
CAL FIRE's Jackson State Forest page,
under Mushroom Permit Information. Without it you are welcome to walk and learn with us,
but you cannot pick — and unlike the other mornings, this day cannot be moved to other ground.
CAL FIRE asks you to allow 10 to 14 days, so apply the day you ask for this morning.
If that is tight, tell me and I will find you another morning.
Minimum 3 guests per foray. Your foray date is selected and assigned automatically, based on guests' ranked preferences, weather conditions and minimum attendance. If none of your chosen dates reaches the minimum, Elk Cove Inn refunds the foray portion of your bundle in full — $120 per guest.
2 · HOW MANY GUESTS?
$240
3 · YOUR DETAILS
We email you as soon as one of your days reaches three guests and is confirmed. Questions? Email Jerome.
Thank you — your choices are in.
As soon as one of your mornings reaches three guests, it is confirmed and we email you the date, the meeting point at the Elk Cove Inn and what to bring.
If none of your three dates reaches three guests, the Inn refunds the foray portion of your bundle in full — $120 per guest. You won't need to chase it.
Jérôme Joanny — twenty years foraging the Sonoma–Mendocino coast. Every foray ends the same way: eating what we found.
