17 things you didn't know about foraging trufflesJohannes MarshallYou probably know truffles as the thing that makes the appetizer expensive, but these mushrooms, which are often worth more than their weight in gold, are expensive for a reason: they're really hard to find. Only in a few parts of the world (mainly Italy, France and the Pacific Northwest) are delicacy-level truffles so valuable that people will literally kill for them. So next time you meet a truffle hunter, say hello and thank you, because these guys deserve a serious hello. ByJohannes Marshall
17 Things You Didn't Know About Foraging for Truffles You probably know truffles as the thing that makes the appetizer expensive, but these mushrooms, which are often worth more than gold by weight, are expensive for a reason: they're very hard. to find. Only in a few parts of the world (mainly Italy, France and the Pacific Northwest) are delicacy-level truffles so valuable that people will literally kill for them. So next time you meet a truffle hunter, say hello and thank you, because these guys deserve a serious hello.
1. If they weren't rare, they wouldn't exist
Truffles grow on the roots of trees. As such, the roots of the host tree and its truffles compete for tasty nutrients in the soil; these fruit-like fungi cannot risk outcompeting their host, otherwise the truffles will die. This means that this can never happenbeea lot of. This kind of mutually beneficial tree-mushroom relationship has a name: marriage. Just kidding, it's mycorrhiza (from the Greek myco meaning fungus and rhiza meaning root). Truffles are almost exclusively intended for the roots of oak, hazel, poplar and beech trees; they are finicky and will only grow when soil conditions (pH, moisture, minerals, etc.) are just right. In short, they are always scarce.
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2. There are thousands of varieties and you don't really want to eat any of them
White truffles from Italy and France are the rarest and most expensive. The remaining $-major varieties, in order of rarity and value, are: black truffles, Bordeaux truffles and white truffles from Oregon, the last of which is the only truffle outside Europe taken seriously by chefs. So if you see "Bayonne New Jersey Truffles" on the menu, stay away.
3. It can take decades for truffle spores to mature
In France, orchards with truffle spores are called truffles, and they are responsible for 80-90% of French truffles. But France only ranks seventh in the world for truffle producing countries (that's after Poland!) This is partly due to the fact that even if you create idyllic truffle growing conditions, their presence is sporadic at best - and besides, you have to wait a few decades after priming a tree for the roots to bear truffles.
4. French truffle yields during foraging peaked around 1890
Like we said: agriculture is not the way, hombre.
5. If they didn't smell, we'd never find them
Truffles depend on animals that dig them up to eat and thus spread their spores. As Jack Czarnecki, founder of Oregon White Truffle Oil and a 26-year veteran of truffle hunting, notes, “Truffles have a very unique combination of aromas. This is the mechanism that attracts animals to dig them up.” Because they grow underground, they smell strongly, and their pungent odor is the secret to their strong taste.
6. Breeders use dogs because their sense of smell is 100,000 times better than ours
While any mushroom-eating animal can smell their deliciousness, dogs are one of the fewtrainedanimals that can track truffles. Their sense of smell has been measured somewhere between 10,000x and 100,000x better than ours. As James Walker, former director of the Sensory Research Institute at FSU, notes: If we compare dogs' sense of smell to another sense, vision, and you can see about 1/3 of a mile, dogs can see 3,000 miles. – and it's at the lower end of the scale, only 10,000 times better.
7. And they use pigs because their sense of smell might be even better
Pigs, like dogs, have a superhuman sense of smell, but they do not need to be trained to find truffles and find them with astonishing regularity (relatively speaking), so traditionalists often claim that they are better truffle feeders. But...
8. The use of pigs to find truffles has been banned in Italy since 1985
Pigs' hooves damage the root system, making it less likely that the same host tree will produce truffles for another year. Italy banned their use, and as Alana McGee, who trains dogs in Oregon to aid in truffle hunting, notes, dogs are more the norm. Pigs are much harder to train and are more likely to eat the truffles after digging them up. Although dogs eat truffles too, it's easier to convince them to go for a peanut butter finger instead.
9. When traditional truffle collectors use pigs, these pigs are often horny
Sows are particularly adept at finding truffles because truffles produce a compound chemically similar to androstenol, the most prominent sex pheromone in a boar's saliva. Lady pigs will chase a whiff of this androstenol-like compound with pig ferocity. Because these pigs literally crave truffles, it can be difficult to keep them on a leash (or to eat the valuable mushroom).
10. You can do it without a four-legged friend at all
Because we have eyes that are much smarter than dogs (we'll never fall for the trick where you.)handlinglike throwing the stick, but not), people can check trees for neat little holes left by rodents that typically dig up nibble-worthy truffles. In the Pacific Northwest, you can find white truffles using this method and careful "raking," which is exactly what it sounds like: use a small four-legged rake to dig them up. The skills of mom yelling at you to remove the leaves from the lawn can go a long way.
11. Truffles are worth more per pound than gold
In 2009, white Italian truffles cost $14,203.50 per kilo on the Italian market. To put that price into perspective, a kilo of gold currently costs $3.7488. And as truffles become increasingly difficult to find in most of the world, prices are rising. To use the language of our time: mo' money, mo' problems.
12. Trading in truffles can mean dealing with criminals
Truffle feeder dogs are often stolen and some people have even been killed because of these mushrooms. The most common offense in the industry is harvesting truffles from someone else's land, which isn't that bad compared to murder.
16. Last year, the largest truffle in the world was sold at auction by Sotheby's
Weighing 4.16 pounds, this truffle found in Italy broke the record for the world's largest. Although some (BBC, CNN) expected it to sell for at least a million dollars, it went for a pound hammer for a not-too-shabby $61,000 to an unnamed Taiwanese buyer.
17. There is no way to tell if a truffle is ripe
Except by eating it. Smell, look, feel - nothing reveals how ready a truffle is to eat, other than chewing it. Dogs can be trained to hunt only ripe mushrooms, but you have to trust Fido's senses – another reason not to hunt without them. McGee claims that not using animals means more unripe truffles hitting the market. “It hurts the entire U.S. industry and has negatively affected the reputation of Oregon truffles.” Like among the murderous and horny pigs these guys don't have enough on their minds?
