The Facts...
- Truffles are highly prized as food, sought after by the top chefs and restaurants around the world and thought to be the ultimate gastronomic experience.
- Truffles are edible mycorrhizal fungi to the experts or underground mushrooms to everyone else.
- Truffles grow in harmony with the host tree, enabling the tree to assimilate phosphorus and in return it receives sugars enabling the truffle to grow.
- Truffle eating is documented as far back as the Roman Empire. In the 17th Century truffles became popular in western cuisine of the rich and noble, particularly in France.
- Truffle hunting carried a Royal warrant for a family business in Wiltshire up until 1930.
- Truffles are sold for hundreds of pounds per kilo – the average price for Burgundy truffle is almost 300/kg.
- A rare Italian white truffle sold for £28,000 at a charity auction in 2004.
- Pigs can be used to find truffles, but the favoured option today is a dog – mainly because dogs do not grow as big, are easier to control and far easier to transport.
- France is the largest producer of truffles, harvesting up to 30 tonnes a year. At the end of the nineteenth century production was over one thousand tonnes!
- Truffle production has declined due to poor management and lack of understanding of truffle production. Some estimates believe the market to be 50 times undersupplied.
- Truffle production is now increasing due to advances in technology, allowing trees to become infected with truffle spores in a controlled environment.
- All truffle tree production in France is certified by an independent agency who examines the plants under a microscope to ensure they are infected with the truffle spores. Only then do they issue certificates to the grower.
- Truffles prefer alkaline soils, summer sunshine, moist conditions (but not overly so) and little competition from other fungi.
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Truffle facts