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wine & cheese

for around EUR 800 per kilo whilst the white range from EUR 2,500 for walnut size to EUR 3,500 for golf balls. I get to hold the biggest one on display, weighing 750 grams – a bargain at only EUR 6,000.

Even better, all the restaurants have special truffl e menus so there’s ample opportunity for tasting. My hosts hustle me into the Osteria del Parco (www.

osteriadelparco.net) restaurant and I get a plate of scrambled eggs and crostini, sprinkled with white truffl e shavings. It might not look much, but by golly, I can taste the truffl e, and that’s the secret – keep the ingredients simple and let the exotic fungus do the fl avouring. It’s diffi cult to describe but it’s a taste you’ll never forget – a fusion of garlic and mushroom.

Over the next couple of days, everything I eat comes with truffl e – pasta, polenta, Carpaccio, veal slices, even pears for desert have a couple of shavings. And if that’s not enough, there are often truffl es on the table so you can grate extra helpings.

Back on the truffl e hunt, Giorgio tells

me that it’s actually possible to cultivate truffl es, although so far he’s only had success with the black variety. Seedlings of oak or ash are inoculated with spores and nurtured in greenhouses. After a year he transplants them to suitable ground and regularly checks their roots for signs of the fungus. It can take eight years for them to be productive and he pulls up those that show no promise. So far he’s planted over 4,000 trees in his 15 hectares, and reckons he gets around 200 kg a year.

He’s so successful that in 2010 he was called to the UK by Prince Philip to investigate why the trees on the Sandringham Estate were not producing any truffl es. He presented a jar of truffl e cream to the Prince who took a sniff, recoiled in horror and asked him if it was stuff that he used for his beard. He’d obviously never encountered truffl es before. After a fruitless search with his dogs, Giorgio’s verdict was that the trees were too young and that the Prince would have to wait. Given he’s over 90, he may well not

live to see royal truffl e production.The rain’s getting heavier but Bobo is

undeterred. He’s digging again and over the course of half an hour we collect 100 grams of white truffl es with a street value of EUR 400. Giorgio says that it’s best to hunt in the early morning as later it warms up and there are too many competing smells to confuse the dog. I ask him if he ever uses pigs to sniff out the truffl es and he shakes his head and smiles: “You can’t talk to pigs,” he tells me. We call it a day and I’m half hoping that I might get a small specimen in payment for my work as truffl e assistant but I’m sadly disappointed. Fortunately, I’ve been asked to call in on Mayor Andrea Pierotti before I leave and he hands me a small paper bag. There’s no disguising what’s inside and, as I take my seat on the plane, I fi nd myself looking forward to my very own truffl e feast. •

Visit Marche Turismo (en.turismo.marche.it) for tourist information about the region. Marche

Holiday (www.marcheholiday.it) can arrange

trips and accommodation.

This really is a shaggy dog story. It’s raining in the woods and I’m following Giorgio Remedia and his long-haired Italian Pointer, who’s running in front, sniffi ng the ground.

He’s searching for the elusive white truffl e, which is an underground mushroom, growing in the root system of trees like oak and poplar. This year has been a bad one for this exotic fungus – deep snow in spring, and then an exceptionally dry summer, means that supply is at a 20-year low. The famine has driven the price through the roof and they’re now selling at around EUR 4,000 a kilo, about one-tenth that of gold.

Suddenly, in the undergrowth, I see Bobo frantically digging with both his front paws and Giorgio wastes no time in taking

over. He brushes him aside and feeds him a small biscuit as a reward. I watch as he carefully excavates the spot and suddenly there’s a glimpse of white in the dark earth. Giorgio gets out his knife and prises out a specimen about the size of a golf ball. He scrapes off the earth, holding it over the

hole so any spores present can seed the next truffl e. Now I get a whiff of its strong earthy, slightly sweet, perfume and my mouth begins to water.

I’ve arrived the previous day in Acqualagna, in the Marche region of Italy, which prides itself on producing truffl es all year round. As a result, this village supplies around two-thirds of the Italian market, around 50 to 60 tons, and every year holds three truffl e fairs to coincide with the harvests. In February and August, it’s black truffl es but now, at the end of October, it’s the Fiera Nazionale del Tartufo Bianco (acqualagna.com/fi ere-tartufo/fi era-nazionale), the white truffl e event. The village square is lined with stalls packed with fresh white and black, as well as jars of preserved pastes, creams and oils. Today the black are going

If you’re going hunting for scarce white truffl es, then the best chance of fi nding any is

in Acqualagna, in the Pesaro-Urbino Province of Italy, as it supplies two-thirds of the

country’s market. Rupert Parker set out to try his luck.

I get scrambled eggs and crostini, sprinkled with white truffl e shavings. It might not look much, but by golly, I can taste the truffl e. That’s the secret – keep the ingredients simple and let the fungus do the fl avouring.

Due to a bad year, supply of truffl es is at a 20-year low.The famine has driven the price through the roof and they’re now selling at around EUR 4,000 a kilo, one-tenth that of gold.

1. Giorgio and Bobo, digging for truffl es

2. Scarce large white truffl es

3. Truffl e-seller in Acqualagna

4. Sliced truffl e

TRUFFLE HUNTING IN LE MARCHE

Above: Edible truffl es are held in high esteem in haute cuisine

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