ALBA,
This particularly warm October, eight out of 10 white truffles unearthed by
“They are clearly signs of the temperatures,’’ Olivero said, holding one that he kept in his pocket. The rest he consigned to the soil, allowing the spores to spread and hopefully replenish future production.
Alba, located in the northwestern region of Piedmont, has earned the moniker “white truffle capital of the world” for its particularly fragrant variety of truffle, its truffle fair each fall and its annual charity auction, which pushes prices of the tuber magnatum pico up into the stratosphere.
A truffle weighing 1,005 grams (2 pounds, 3.4 ounces) fetched
The longer-term impact of rising temperatures on the highly prized white truffles is still being studied, but they, like other fungi, grow best in cool, rainy conditions. Climate change has in effect delayed peak production from October into November.
“It has been a few years that we have been worrying about truffle production,” said
To stave off the longer-term climate change impact on the production of the highly prized white truffle, experts have launched initiatives to better preserve the territory where they grow. The goal is to safeguard the symbiosis between the truffle and the host plant by encouraging symbiosis between the truffle hunter and the land owner — whose interests often conflict.
Olivero recalled a maker of the region’s famed
“I told him, ‘The day you take all the oaks, only you will drink your wine,’” Olivero said. “Because the truffle and the
Unlike the more common black truffle, delicate white truffles cannot so far be cultivated, which makes preservation of their environment critical.
Incentives include a program paying
This year’s charity auction white truffle price —
After an unusually hot and long summer, this November’s damp, foggy weather has proved perfect for truffle hunting around Alba.
“In these days, the quality is especially high,’’ said truffle judge
That included a 730-gram (1 pound, 9.75 ounce) white truffle unearthed by Davide Curzietti on Saturday, the largest of the annual truffle fair to date. Judges certified the provenance of the behemoth tuber, which Curzietti sold immediately to a restaurant in
Even after more than four decades on the truffle hunt, Olivero still gets emotional when Steel stops his energetic sniffing of the damp ground.
Steel’s nose is faultless. Through a carpet of wet autumn leaves and muddy earth, the dog picks up the sweet, distinctive aroma of a white truffle and signals his find by rapidly digging on the surface.
“I call it the magic moment, because it means that there is something under there that we were looking for. We still don’t know the dimensions, how big it will be, but the heartbeat speeds up because in that moment, we know there is something,’’ Olivero said.
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