A few years ago, the chef Giorgio Locatelli took me into a dark store room, and shoved a large white truffle - it was the size of an elephant's testicle - in my face. 'See?' he said, nostrils inflating like two fleshy sails. 'Eet smell like ze intestine of ze pig on heat, no?' At the time, I had no idea what the intestine of a pig on heat might smell like; I still don't. But I knew what he meant. There, among his eggs and his risotto rice, I could smell both sex (raw animal sex, of the kind a person might enjoy in the last few moments before the end of the world) and death (those gag-inducing top notes of rotting vegetation and liverish skin). It was the kind of smell that made you want to be sick. It was the kind of smell, to be frank, that made you want to turn on your heels and run.
Cut to a check-in line at Turin airport, in which I am standing, patiently, trying to keep my head down. To meet anyone's eye would, I think, be a big mistake. Because in my bag, wrapped in paper and stored in a glass jar, are three truffles: two white, and one black. I am transporting these fungi, which I bought at the 76th annual Truffle Fair in Alba, back to London, where I intend to give them to a friend who is celebrating a birthday. This morning, when I removed the jar from the hotel mini-bar where I'd stored it overnight, I was careful to give its lid an extra firm twist. I sniffed and I sniffed, and no stench - not even the farty beginnings of a stench - was to be detected. Now, though, I am not so sure. There is definitely something whiffy in the environs of this check-in queue - and I have every reason to believe that its source is probably my suitcase.
Oh, the perils of foodie travel! In her new book, Truffles, the cookery writer Elisabeth Luard reveals that Franco Taruschio, former owner of The Walnut Tree Inn, once transported 'a modest kilo' of Piedmont truffles from Italy to London in his hand baggage. Which was fine, save for the fact that his fellow passengers took great exception to the stink. In the end, he and his wife were asked to remove both themselves and their luggage from the airport departure lounge, and wait outside until called. I am, then, mightily relieved when the woman at the desk finally puts my bag on the conveyor belt and it disappears through those cheery plastic flaps, though it could still attract the attention of the sniffer dogs. Even so, the smell of the truffles is in my nostrils now, and remains so throughout my flight. And when I get home - oh, God - the trip has sent the truffles demented. I hold the jar in front my husband's face, and his head snaps back violently, as though he has been slapped.
The Piedmont white truffle (Tuber magnatum) is the most lusted-after fungus in the world. Some people like the Périgord black truffle (Tuber melanosporum) just as much, but because it is not as rare as its Italian counterpart (which grows only in parts of northern Italy, Croatia and a wedge of southern Switzerland), nor its season so short (white truffles can only be gathered from October to December), it is neither as prized nor as expensive (white truffles cost an amazing €2,500 to €3,500 a kilo). The magnatum, then, attracts myth and madness in almost equal measure, some truffle-related outrage now appearing in the newspapers almost every year. A few years ago, it was those city boys who formed a syndicate and bought, at vast expense, a giant truffle, only for it to be left in a fridge to rot (truffles must be used within 10 days of being found). This year, the hot news is the new Pizza Express trifolata, featuring truffle oil and five kinds of mushroom - though none of these is actually, er, a truffle.
I love truffles; not their smell, of course - though once they are shaved, that becomes weirdly enjoyable - but the amazing earthy flavour they impart to eggs, risotto or polenta. Especially eggs. It is indescribably seductive: sexy and comforting at the same time (truffles, like chocolate, contain pheremones, so they stimulate both appetite and sex drive). But I also have a sort of psychic connection to them. I knew about truffles long before I ever tasted them because my father was a mycologist, a mushroom and toadstool expert - a fungi to be with, if you want to be funny about it. This was an unusual kind of profession, not to say an obscure one. Other girls could rattle off lists of all the latest Sindy doll accessories; I, on the other hand, knew that the red-and-white-spotted toadstool on which gnomes liked to sit was properly called fly agaric, and though it looked jolly and benign, it was in fact highly toxic.
In 1981, my father wrote a book, Fungi, which he dedicated to his children (there are four of us). A field guide, it was meant to be more accessible than his other work. I'd be lying if I said I whipped through it with the same speed as I did the Famous Five - it's full of sentences like 'in some species, for instance Cyathus striatus, the funnel mouth is somewhat flared' - but I was keen on the pictures: the photo of a man in a beret hunting for truffles with a pig, and another, from 1901, of a British truffle hunter called Eli Collins with his two truffle dogs and his special fork, used 'for lifting the truffle'. Fungi were fascinating in their way: they could kill you, or they could make your fortune. Yet to look at, they were so repulsive. Puffballs, stinkhorns, ink caps: they gave me the creeps, especially if you kicked them, exploding their dusty black spores. Truffles, on the other hand, were more furtive - secretive, even; they didn't clamber over things in such a brazen fashion. I was hooked - even if, in the Britain of Ski yoghurts and Angel Delight, I was about as likely to come across a freshly grated truffle as I was a startled unicorn.
So let us go back to the beginning, to my arrival - fresh-smelling and totally stink-free - at Turin airport. I've come to Piedmont on a truffle pilgrimage (Fungi, in its first, and probably last edition, is in my bag). Over the next three days, I will be hunting for truffles with a bona fide truffle hunter; I will be attending the Truffle Festival in Alba; and I will, I hope, be eating lots of them. I have been warned, however, that I should not get overly excited. For reasons no one can quite fathom, Alba has its festival early in the season, when truffles are not yet at their most potent. Plus, truffle hunting is now so lucrative that even those with licences tend to perform little white deceptions on tourists. Not wanting to give their secrets away, they take tourists on dummy hunts, where truffles are either found not at all or, worse, too easily, the grown-up equivalent of an Easter-egg hunt. The moment a person finds their first truffle in the quiet of the forest is supposed to be magical. But it is increasingly rare.
I spend the night at Cascina Papaveri, an Agriturismo in the Monferrato region which specialises in Pilates. Hmm. I couldn't care less about Pilates. Just lead me to the truffles! But on the truffle front, all is quiet - or at least it is until day two when, hanging around in the Cascina's kitchen, a man with a smile on his face appears. This man could have walked straight out of a pre-war Italian movie. He looks like a Mexican bandit. He has brown skin, a luxurious moustache, and he smells meaty. In his hand is a handkerchief. It contains around 20 truffles, one of which he's willing to sell to the Cascina's chef (although white truffles, unlike black, should never be cooked, only delicately shaved). They're good, even I can tell that. A freshly-dug truffle looks like dirty pebble or, at a push, a new potato, and the more spherical it is, the better: kinks can hide decay (or dirt, which dodgy dealers use to increase a fungus's weight). His are dry, too; moisture is a sure sign of decay. How do they smell? Awful.
Day three, and we go on an extremely frustrating daytime forage with Renato Agnello, one of the 8,000 licensed truffle hunters in this region. We meet him in the village of Barbaresco, famed for its wine, and set out by walking through the vineyards of Angelo Gaya, Italy's most talented wine maker. On the way, he shows us a photograph of his father, holding a fungus the size of child's shoe, and tells us how hard it is, these days, to find truffles. It's not only the competition that is a problem. The growing popularity of Italian wine has meant that woodlands, which is where truffles lurk, have been replaced with vines. Plus, the climate is changing: it's too hot and dry. 'Vai, vai!' he says, in Piedmontese to his dog, making a show of being on the hunt. But nothing doing. Renato is a handsome fellow, but his eyes dart like minnows. He is certainly not about to share his secrets with us. I ask him what prices he is getting this year; he swiftly changes subject. Our translator laughs. 'A truffle hunter will never, ever tell you how much he sells them for,' she says.
That night, having moved deeper into truffle country - my hotel is close to Bra, home of the Slow Food movement - I meet up with Giuseppe Giamesio, and his dog Chiara (some dogs are trained at a School For Truffle Hounds - it exists, I promise - but Giuseppe nurtures his own). We are to go into the woods under cover of darkness, and this time, I am reassured, the exercise will be for real. It is not necessary to hunt for truffles at night, but lots do; Giuseppe tells me that an unofficial shift system is in place, whereby he will be out of the woods before the next lot of hunters arrive. Still, he is anxious not to be seen. We must be very quiet, and keep our torches pointing at the ground, so as to draw as little attention to ourselves as possible. The area where he is to take us had already yielded some fine specimens this season. He sniffs the air conspiratorially. He is hopeful we will get lucky tonight.
Truffles are complicated. In ancient times, as Alan Davidson notes in the Oxford Companion to Food, no one understood what they were or how they grew. Theophrastus thought that they were produced by the rain of thunderstorms; Dioscorides that they were a kind of root; Pliny that they were 'calliosities of earth'; and Plutarch that lightning was a necessary condition of their formation. In fact, a truffle is just the fruiting body of a fungus which grows wholly underground. The plant itself consists of an extensive web of filaments so fine as to be invisible. These filaments - the mycelium - link up with the roots of certain trees in a 'mycorrhizal' relationship that benefits both parties. The trees that most usually play host to white truffles are oak, linden and hornbeam.
All of which is very interesting. But what intrigues me is their amazing rate of growth. The dedicated hunter goes out every single day because his precious ivory princess can literally spring up overnight.
Truffles grow 10-15cm underground, which is why dogs are used to find them (pigs are not terribly agile and are also greedy; you have to fight them for the truffle). But there are other ways. An experienced hunter will look for bumps and cracks in the ground that betray the bulges below. You can also use hovering truffle flies, which deposit their larvae on the fungus, as your guide. Giuseppe, however, puts his faith in his dog, who runs round furiously in the moonlight. It is a bewitching scene: the quiet of the woods; the spectral glow that falls from the clear starlit sky through the branches below; the old man practising his ancient art. At one moment, Chiara thinks she's found something. She scrabbles in the damp earth and Giuseppe, pushing her aside, takes over with his pick. But, no. Someone, he mutters darkly, has beaten us to it.
Just as well, then, that there is still the truffle fair to look forward to. Alba is a medieval town set among vineyards, and its festival - the Fiera Nazionale del Tartufo Bianco - is the most famous in all Italy and runs for three weeks in September. It's a bit like Borough Market, except the only things you can buy are truffles, and truffle products (oil, pasta, pâté, sausage). It's intimidating at first, especially right in the central arena, where the hunters are selling their wares, organised tidily under glass domes. It's a scrum, no one speaks English, and the truffles are, at first sight, much of a muchness. Luckily, help is at hand. For one thing, I've spotted my friend the Mexican bandit, better known as Ronzano Giovanni; at least I know that his truffles are fresh. ('Viagra,' he says to me, using the international word for aphrodisiac.) For another, once you've chosen your truffle, you can take it to a boffin from Alba's Centro Nazionale Studi Tartufo for examination. If he gives you the nod, it's good to go. He gives Ronzano's the nod, and I hand over a wad of euros - though my wedge is nothing compared to that of the Italian in front of me, who spends €1,000, and is almost salivating with pleasure (some people dash out of the festival and into the nearest restaurant, where they get the waiters to shave their purchase straight over their order).
Back in London, I deliver my truffles to their new owner who, in an act of generosity that I really don't think was prompted by anything in my voice, later invites us for dinner. Were they good? Yes, very good. As delicious as anything I've ever tasted. The quest element of truffles - in spite of all that scientists like my father have thrown at them, they can still not be reliably cultivated - will always add to their allure. But they'd still taste heavenly even if they were 10 to a penny.
Were a suitor to make you an omelette aux truffes, there's probably nothing you wouldn't do for him (though your naked greed would be on display, which the dating guides always - wrongly, in my view - insist is a Bad Thing). As for my weekend bag, it is still mildly pongy. When I stick my head inside it, it makes me think of bosky valleys, and of all the truffles that I hope to find next year and - global warming allowing - the year after that.
· For more information about visiting the Piemonte region visit www.piemontefeel.it or call 00800 66677700. A four night stay at Cascina Papaveri starts from £446 per person. Price includes food, wine, two cookery lessons, market visit, Pilates and use of all facilities. Truffle hunts can be arranged in season. For further information call 0845 070 6925 or visit www.cascinapapaveri.com. Ryanair operates a daily service from London Stansted to Turin, with fares starting from £27 return including taxes and charges. www.ryanair.com
Eggs with truffles and cream
By Elisabeth Luard
Eggs and truffles are a winning combination. This is one of the most exquisite truffled egg dishes I've eaten.
Serves 4 as a starter
50g fresh black truffle, cleaned
4 large free-range eggs
100ml single cream
salt and pepper
25g butter
2 tbs pine nuts
Slice off the tops of the eggs carefully with a sharp knife. Separate the yolks from the whites. Combine the egg yolks with the cream and season with salt, pepper and truffle juice, if the truffles are canned. Beat the whites to a stiff foam with a little salt.
Reserve four thin rounds of the truffles and slice the rest into matchstick strips: place them inside the eggshells. Melt the butter and toss the truffle slices over the heat for a couple of minutes. Season and reserve.
Pour coarse salt into an oven-proof dish. Arrange the eggshells on the salt, pressing them so they stand up. Pour as much yolk and cream mixture into the shells as they will hold.
Bake for two minutes in a preheated oven at 180C/350F/gas mark 4. Remove and top with the whisked white, stuck with a few pinenuts. Return to the oven for another two minutes.
Lift off the lids, tuck in the truffle slices, and replace the lids.
Serve with toast-soldiers, as for plain soft-boiled eggs.
· Truffles by Elisabeth Luard is published by Frances Lincoln, 20, photographs by John Heseltine
