What exactly is the white truffle? The latest explanation is here
The white truffle is a wild plant fungus of the genus Tuber in the family Tuberaceae, similar to mushrooms and porcini. It was first discovered in 1950 and later became a delicacy at banquets, known as the white diamond. In the 1950s and 1960s, the white truffle king was given by clever Italian truffle merchants as gifts to the most famous people in the world, such as Churchill, Marilyn Monroe, Hitchcock, Pavarotti and Gorbachev. The stardom plus the magical effect of white truffles doubled the truffle's value, making it leap to become a top international ingredient.
The white truffle is a food seasoning. It should be eaten raw, without cooking, because the most useful thing is the sweet aroma of the white truffle, a rich fragrance like garlic, and it will lose its flavor when exposed to fire. Because the white truffle gives off a rich aroma with a garlic smell, ordinary Italians like to eat it with cheese slices or bread, and using it in dishes helps enhance the aroma and taste of the food. Because it can only be dug up by dogs with approved licenses using their keen sense of smell, and to keep it fresh it can only be stored for about ten days after being dug up, the white truffle is extremely expensive.
The white truffle itself does not taste particularly special when eaten, but because it gives off a special odor, many people have been fascinated by it since ancient times. In 1825, the famous French gourmet Brillat-Savarin praised truffles in his book The Physiology of Taste as “the diamond of the kitchen”. Europeans rank truffles alongside caviar and foie gras as the “three great delicacies of the world”, and they are one of the noble ingredients, especially the black truffle from France and the white truffle from Italy, which are rated the highest. When eating truffles, they cannot be heated, nor chewed in large mouthfuls. They are more like a spice, shaved into extremely thin slices with a professional tool, shaved and eaten fresh. Each time you only need to sprinkle some crumbs on ordinary dishes, and it can produce a world-shaking, earth-shattering effect.
White truffles generally weigh 30 to 40 grams, with a rough brown appearance and a hard texture. After digging them out, just wipe the surface soil clean; there is no need to wash them. To keep the fresh flavor, it is best to eat them within two weeks. The price fluctuates every year, but it is usually between 800 and 1500 US dollars per pound (453 grams). The largest white truffle in history was discovered in 1951, weighing about 4 pounds, and the price at that time was 5000 US dollars, but 5000 US dollars was, for people who had just finished World War II not long before, an “astronomical price” no matter how you looked at it.
China also produces white truffles, mainly concentrated in the areas around Yunnan and Sichuan. The white truffles with higher edible value are mainly divided into two types. Compared with European white truffles, they are slightly smaller, but there is not much difference in the unique odor of white truffles, and the quality of mature white truffles is still excellent. Early domestic white truffles were rejected by the French growers' association because they seized a large share of the European market, so the export price was lower at the time of purchase, but as world white truffle production gradually decreased, its price has risen rapidly year by year.
The white truffle represents the most expensive luxury in the world in fine dining, just as Rolls-Royce does in cars, Versace in fashion, and Chanel No. 5 in perfume. It combines a jaw-dropping price, mysterious and magical legends, and a taste like sweet rain, and has always been an object pursued by wealthy patrons around the world, who spare no expense to get close to its “fragrance”. In the famous town of Tuscany in Italy, the main white truffle producing area, Italy's first truffle museum will officially open to visitors on the 13th, telling tourists the legendary story of truffles.