Creating Mushroom Magic Amidst Moroccan Rugs
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Michelle Russell hopes to stage an unforgettable night creating artful plates out of locally grown fungi.
 
Monday, August 18, 2025
 

BY KAREN BOSSICK


Plant-food chef and mushroom lover Michelle Russell will turn the Davies-Reid building in Ketchum into a multi-sensory journey of fungi and plants boasting the spices of Morocco’s Marrakesh amidst Davies-Reid’s global art, handwoven rugs and hypnotic sounds on Saturday, Aug. 23.


The dinner will feature aromatic botanicals and umami-rich flavors and nonalcoholic elixirs featuring Syrian Rue, Sassafras and Mimosa Bark prepared by Russell, who calls herself “a culinary disruptor and master of mushroom alchemy.”


The dinner will start at 7 p.m. and will cost $150 per person, with tickets available at https://daviesreid.com/products/marrakesh-express.


Russell lives parttime in the Wood River Valley and parttime on the Oregon Coast. She has co-authored a cookbook titled “Just Mushrooms: celebrating the future of food,” that offers ways to cook mushrooms for flavor and health. She calls mushrooms the sustainable food source of the future—after all, they are 30 percent protein. Recipes include a Uramaki Combs Tooth Sushi Roll, Thai Curry Patties, Lion’s Mane Pudding and a Mushroom Gravy.


“I’m inspired by fun and a love of creating novel experiences for people,” said Russell, a former professor turned mycophile. “I love to disrupt the status quo and offer other ways to imagine cuisine and dining.”


 

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