What Toque is
Toque is a Psilocybe cubensis line usually described as an isolation of Tidal Wave by Tim Pigg. Telly Monster Myco explains the name: a stacked, hat-on-a-hat cap that looks like a chef's toque, on thick fruits with a layered form. Tidal Wave is itself usually described as Penis Envy x B+, and Dino Spores traces Toque's fuzzy "party hat" back to that B+ parent. The same vendor says some Toque fruits develop green spots on the cap and that the line occasionally produces very large fruit.
Sonoran Spores describes the caps of its Toque F8 as "extremely mutated and cool looking", with a bulge on top that often turns dark blue or even black. Toque is listed by Dino Spores, Sonoran Spores, TecheGenetics, Mr Rogers Labz, Fungus Frequency and Telly Monster Myco, as swabs, liquid culture and research plates. None of them describes it as a pale line, so expect ordinary cubensis spores and the usual purple-brown print.
F numbers in plain words: Toque F8 and Toque F12
F stands for filial, meaning a generation. F1 is the first generation after a cross is made or a line is started; every number after that is one more round in which the breeder takes the next generation from the individuals that look most like the target. Toque F8 has been through eight of those rounds, Toque F12 through twelve.
A higher number tells you the line has been selected for longer, usually to make the offspring look more alike. It does not promise that they will. Dino Spores says Toque is "somewhat unstable even after 12 generations of work" and still produces a variety of forms. An F12 is not a better Toque than an F8, just a later point on the same line, and the count is the breeder's own, so two vendors' F8 are only the same material if they share a source.
Toque F8 is listed by Sonoran Spores as liquid culture and by TecheGenetics as agar. Toque F12 is listed by Dino Spores as a swab set and by Mr Rogers Labz as swabs and as liquid culture, which that vendor says was sourced from Tim Pigg himself. Fungus Frequency and Telly Monster Myco list plain Toque with no generation given.
F numbers also travel into cross names, because a breeder will say which generation of Toque was used. Mr Rogers Labz lists Nipsey Hussle as Mr Rogers x Toque F8. Black Forest Cultures lists Faquey as SDG x Toque F7 and Hatmosphere with Toque F7 too, though its two Hatmosphere listings name different partners (SNAPE on one, Bloberry on the other). Moondaddy lists Smokey da Ghost as a cross of Toque 9 and Indian Graveyard, with the generation written without the F.
What isolation and mutant isolation mean on a label
Isolation, or iso, is used in two related senses. The narrow one is a single individual separated out of a line and kept going as a clone, so every culture sold under the name traces back to that one pick. The broader one is a line selected out of a parent over several generations, picking the best individual each time, which is how Toque can be an isolation of Tidal Wave and still carry an F12. A spore syringe from an isolate still carries the genetic shuffle that every spore print carries, but from one parent rather than many; isolated vs multispore syringes explains the difference.
A mutant isolation is the same idea applied to something unusual: an individual that came out looking different by chance, which someone noticed and kept for that reason. Electrum is the example here. Hyphal Mind lists it as a Sporexchange Toque F11 mutant isolation and gives the account: Sporexchange received spores from Tim Pigg, a small mutant pin appeared on an agar plate during that spore work, and it was cloned and worked for several months into what the vendor calls a "meaty mutant". Summer Breeze Mycology also lists Electrum, as liquid culture.
Green Toque is listed by Telly Monster Myco, Summer Breeze Mycology, Mushrealm USA and Mushrealm UK. Telly Monster Myco gives only the Toque background, and the Mushrealm listings say it is part of their ACS collection. The name echoes the green spots Dino Spores describes on some Toque caps, but no listing says how Green Toque was selected, so read it as a named Toque selection and nothing more specific.
El Choco and El Toque
El Choco is a Sporeworks isolate syringe. Sporeworks' account is that Dave Wombat isolated it in 2020, from the TAT Syndicate Facebook group, as a random mutation of B+, and that it has a very unusual, generally squat look. By their vendors' accounts, that puts B+ in the background of both El Choco and Toque.
El Toque is El Choco crossed with Toque F8, sold by Mushrealm USA and Mushrealm UK as El Toque F2 isolated syringes and credited as an original cross by Clusterduck. The F2 counts from the new cross, not from Toque: every new cross starts the count again at F1, which is why a line can carry Toque F8 in its parentage and still be labelled F2.
Toque crossed with Jack Frost
Three separate crosses pair Toque with Jack Frost, made by different people. Toque x Jack Frost is an isolated syringe from Mushrealm USA and Mushrealm UK. ToqueJack is a Black Forest Cultures research plate, described as the original Toque x Jack Frost by Dave Wombat, passed on by Dichotomous Keys. FROTO is an in-house cross by Q at What The Fungi, listed as Jack Frost x Toque. Same two parents, three different crosses, so expect them to differ. The Jack Frost family tree covers the white side of the pairing.
Toque Gates and Tokahauntas
Toque Gates is a Mr Rogers Labz swab set of Toque F8 x Lucid Gates, which the vendor calls "a one of a kind beauty". What the Gates half of the name usually signals is explained in the Gates lines explained. Tokahauntas is a Summer Breeze Mycology liquid culture listed without a description. The name carries Toque, but no second parent is given, so it is a line to ask the vendor about rather than one to read a pedigree into.
Reading a Toque label
Look for three things. The generation tells you how far along its line the material is, and it resets with each new cross. The isolate, if there is one, tells you whose pick you are getting. The second parent in any cross matters because a Toque cross can look very different from Toque itself. Expect variety even in late generations, and treat every lineage above as the vendor's own account, since none of it is documented outside the hobby.
Psilocybe and Panaeolus spores on Culture Cave are sold for microscopy and taxonomy use only, and buyers must know their local law before they order; the US legality guide covers the state by state picture.