The
truffle
The truffle
is the real king of Piedmontese
cuisine.
As rare as
it is pungent, this small tuber is capable of sparking off a real gold rush,
which is not only metaphorical in view of its cost. Every Autumn, in the Langhe,
Monferrato and Roero hills, the "trifôlaô", or truffle hunters, and their dogs
(the real hunters) take to the paths between poplars and lime trees, and along
slopes covered with oak and willow trees looking for the underground nugget will
then reign on the dining table, in recipes that exalt its aroma and
taste.
The best
and most valuable is certainly the white
truffle from Alba, but several types can be found in the hills of
The
discovery of the truffle can be dated: the first written records that mention
its use and sale date back two thousand years, to Roman times. Gioacchino Rossini called it the “Mozart of
mushrooms” and Byron kept one on his
desk because it fed his imagination.
What is
it?
It is a hypogean or underground mushroom that belongs to the
Ascomycetes class, order tuberales, family tuberacee, genus tuber. There are numerous species: the Magnatum Pico (white truffle), Melanosporum Vit (black truffle), Albidum, Aestivum and Brumale (Winter
truffle).
Like
all mushrooms, the truffle's roots are a voluminous and very ramified mass of
white filaments (known as hyphas). The fruit, in the form of a tuber, is a
fleshy mass, known as a "glebe", covered with a tough skin known as the
"peridium". The structural and chromatic characteristics of these parts make
identifying the type of truffle very easy.
The white
Alba truffle can vary in color,
depending on the plant on whose roots it grows: from white with occasional pink
veining, to grey tending to brown.
After its
formation, the truffle becomes a true parasite, sucking the sap that the
plant's roots extract from the ground, the source of its perfume, taste and
color. The truffles with the most persistent odor which keep best are those that
grow in contact with oak trees, while the most aromatic and lightest in color
grow on lime trees.
The soil obviously has to be suitable: the best is limestone or clay
with some silica. Altitude is also important: they are very rare above 600-700
metres.
The season
extends from late August to January
and a root usually produces only one truffle per year.
In the
Monferrato and Langhe hills, truffles are used raw, cut into thin slices to decorate
certain recipes: from a salad of "ovuli"
or porcini mushrooms embellished with truffles, to a "parmigiana" with alternate layers of
truffle, celery and thin slices of Parmesan.
But there
are plenty of other dishes in which the truffle reigns supreme, setting free its
unique aroma: a salad of minced raw
veal, "tajarin" fresh pasta, fondue, a fried egg, prosciutto, grilled fillet, veal cutlets in butter, or tagliata (minute steak) with herbs, on delicate or perfectly
ripened cheese, or alone, with a
drizzle of extravirgin olive oil.