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Primo and Scilla led us deeper into the forests near Amandola, in central Italy. Over a babbling brook, up a muddy slope, over mossy tree branches, through a tangle of brambles and vines, the dogs covered acres of ground. For nearly three hours, their olfactory senses were on high alert for white truffles, a delicacy with rising prices, largely because they are extremely threatened by climate change.
Gram for gram, the white truffle is one of the most expensive foods in the world. In Italy, fresh white truffles cost as much as 4,500 euros per kilogram (or almost $2,200 per pound), according to Coldiretti, Italy’s largest agricultural trade group. As soon as they are shaved onto a plate of risotto or roasted quail in the best restaurants in the world, the price will multiply again, which underlines their nickname ‘white gold’. Acquerello in San Francisco offers a $495 truffle tasting menu (excluding wine and tax). Trufflephiles in London and Dubai can expect an equally expensive check.
Last year, a one-and-a-half-pound example fetched a record price of €184,000 (almost $200,000) at auction in Alba, Italy. Despite the supply constraints, bidders will converge on Alba, Italy’s truffle capital, on Sunday to do it all again.
With more extreme weather, shrinking forest habitat and high demand, sky-high prices will be the norm, truffle experts say.
The Tuber magnatum Pico, or white truffle, has always been difficult to find. (Efforts to breed it on truffle farms have led to some breakthroughs from scientists, but these are not enough to meet the rising demand from truffle fans.) In Italy, the truffles grow in selected places and colonize near the roots of oak, beech and poplar trees.
Truffles obtain nutrients from and nourish their woody neighbors. Given enough moisture and cool air, they fruit and ripen underground, signaling to dogs and woodland creatures where they are.
During the recent hunt in the woods near Amandola, Alessio Galiè, a 38-year-old tartufaio, or truffle hunter, pointed out the scenes of previous conquests, including the six he unearthed earlier this week. Meanwhile, Primo and Scilla patrolled with their noses to the ground. Every now and then they picked up a scent. The anticipation of a score seemed as thick as the morning mist.
As the hours passed, Mr. Galiè resorted to some tricks to keep the dogs focused. Whenever he lost sight of them, he hid a few truffles deep in the ground. When the dogs noticed a scent, they would walk back and dig it up, earning a treat. But that’s as much action as the dogs got. There were no truffles that day, Mr. Galiè concluded gloomily, waving his catch ghetto, a harpoon-like kick.
If there are no truffles to be found, something is wrong.
A bone-dry summer and a drought in the fall have thrown this year’s truffle trade into disarray. The same can be said of last year and the year before that. “The climate is not good,” said Mr Galiè. (The climate has also been blamed for Italy’s olive oil crisis.)
The ancients called these aromatic fungi, which appear on the market for a few weeks every autumn, ‘the food of the gods’. Some consider them aphrodisiacs because of the endorphin-inducing essence they contain.
“The calls start coming in the summer,” months before the season officially opens in mid-October, says Roberto Saracino, founder of Liaison West Distribution, an Italian truffle distributor based in Vernon, California, whose customers include top restaurants in the region. Las Vegas, San Francisco and neighboring Los Angeles. It’s important that he lives up to their expectations, he said. “I don’t have a crystal ball.”
It was even worse last year, when the usual spring and autumn rains failed to materialize and yields dropped. The price at the time was €5,000 per kilogram. “Global warming, or whatever we want to call it, is definitely driving a downward trend in the availability of truffles,” Mr. Saracino said.
The high price tag is a big point of discussion among Italian truffle hunters, of whom Coldiretti estimates there are more than 73,000. Most Italian truffle hunters see the chase as an excuse to bond with nature, dogs and other truffle lovers, says Giancarlo Marini, who runs an Italian truffle export company, Marini Tartufi, in Italy’s Marche region.
“But in the back of his mind, every time the hunter goes into the woods, there’s a chance that today will also be a good day’s work,” he added. The big payout mentality has a dark side; the pastime is marred by a spate of dog poisonings by territorial truffle hunters.
After arriving empty in the forest, the next stop was a truffle fair in Amandola. In a room near the community theater, vendors displayed their aromatic finds. A seller took a truffle out from under a glass and weighed it: 16 grams, no bigger than a walnut. Price: €40. The seller refused to negotiate. Sold!
