The Trouble with Truffles

Two people from North Carolina are carrying on a nasty legal battle over truffles:

Over the past few years, the two have sued and countersued in Orange County Civil Superior Court over business plans, trade secrets and the sale of specially inoculated trees that grow truffles on their roots.

Their case has been in and out of mediation. Now, they are at a standoff, waiting for the court to decide who was wrong.

Black Truffle

The fact is, neither is digging up that many truffles. Although about 80 orchards make up the tiny North Carolina truffle industry, the harvest this year was probably not even 50 pounds, said Jane Morgan Smith, the recent past president of the North American Truffle Growers Association and one of the first people to grow them successfully in the state.

White Truffle

Still, if the fungus comes, the payoff could be huge.

Truffle orchards could help replace tobacco as a crop and preserve farmland. Cooks who embrace local food could stop looking to Europe for their truffle fix. And the two warring truffle growers could make hundreds of thousands of dollars just by digging around the roots of their trees.

An acre of trees cultivated to grow high-quality black Perigord truffles (the Tuber melanosporum, nicknamed the black diamond) can produce at least 75 pounds. Even at a wholesale price of about $600 a pound, a truffle farmer could earn $45,000 an acre.

Truffles come in two colors, black and white. But there are several native species of truffle in the United States that are all highly sought after. Truffles grow symbiotically on the roots of oaks, live oaks and hickories.

Trained pigs are often used as truffle hunters.  Wild hogs eat truffles naturally, so pigs have an innate interest in finding them and eating them.  Curiously, pigs are particularly attracted to truffles because one of the scent components of truffles smells like androstenol, a sex pheromone in boar saliva.  Dogs can also be used to find truffles, although they lack the innate desire to eat them, they make up for it with a keen sense of smell (maybe they like boar saliva), and a desire to please the boss and get a treat.

Once upon a time, I dug up what I think were white truffles in our yard.  They smelled wonderful, but I couldn't persuade Georgia that they were edible...  Given the prices of truffles, it's unlikely that they will form any significant part in our diet anytime soon.