Sue Style, Food, Wine and Travel Writer

Every year at this time a familiar story unfolds as truckloads of truffle-hunters head for Piedmont in search of the celebrated tartufo bianco. Upmarket packaged tourists pay eye-watering prices to include a stop at Alba’s famous weekend truffle markets in their autumn itinerary, the press pack descends for the annual auction, and hordes of truffle-hungry visitors get ripped off by furtive individuals on street corners or by unscrupulous restaurateurs, all too ready to meet the insatiable demand for the infinitely desirable Tuber magnatum.

With hindsight, 2003, with its extraordinary drought conditions throughout Europe, probably wasn't the best year for me to embark on my truffle career. But Mario Fontana, a delightful young winegrower in the Barolo area, came to the rescue and rose to the challenge of taking my tartufo education in hand.

Our first port of call was Tartufi Morra in Alba, whence truffles are dispatched worldwide. We were bidden backstage and down into the cellar where an expert was patiently sifting through the new arrivals. An astonishing, seductive, animal-like aroma bounced off the barrel-vaulted ceiling and walls and left us reeling and lightheaded. Most specimens were the size of golf balls, with the occasional tennis ball in their midst.

But size – in truffles as in other things – isn’t everything, and the largest ones can, it seems, be disappointingly dumb. More desirable still is a smooth complexion: deeply pitted, knobbly tubers may shelter dirt and impurities in their nooks and crannies, leading to nasty (and expensive) surprises. Most important of all is that unmistakeable, intense, distinctly vulgar perfume - we watched as each individual tuber was gravely sniffed and sorted by smell.

The selection process complete and the orders secured, the truffles are placed tenderly in wicker baskets set inside specially constructed polystyrene cartons. The basket is braced by ice packs (just like the ones in your picnic box) to keep the precious cargo fresh till it reaches its destination – which could be anywhere from Milan to Zurich, Paris, London, New York or Tokyo.

What about cost? Alessandro Bonino, responsible for worldwide sales at Tartufi Morra, rolled his eyes heavenward. In 2003, thanks to the extraordinary drought conditions, prices ranged outrageously between 3,000 and 6,000 euros (£2,100-£4,200) per kilo, depending on quality. He selected one about the size of a gobstopper and placed it on the scale. Eleven grams, about enough to shave over a couple of miserable servings of pasta if one was inclined to muster 60 euros (42 GBP) for the pleasure.

Truffle hunters do it at night. Our programme thus continued under cover of darkness and fog, in true Piedmontese style, as we met up with Gino the trifolao and his little white dog whose name sounded like Beel (as in Clinton). The three of us piled into Gino’s sturdy Fiat.

Once out of the village, we slithered off uphill on a muddy track to a nearby hazelnut orchard. The dog trotted off purposefully, with us in hot pursuit. Gino kept up a steady stream of encouraging noises and fluty, reed-like whistles, urging Beel to cover the ground. Suddenly the dog checked, sniffed and scratched around tentatively in the leaves. Then it scampered back joyfully to Gino as if to say: ‘hey, come and see what I found!’

Then began a fascinating routine. Each time the dog checked, sniffed and returned to its owner, Gino rewarded it with a piece of bread from his pocket. The dog then led him back to the place where it had first nosed out its prize. A bit of a scuffle ensued, with Beel scratching away beneath the leaves with just one carefully trained paw while Gino shone his torch onto the spot and scrabbled away too.

In the gathering gloom of the hazelnut grove it made a wonderful tableau, reminiscent of a Joseph Wright of Derby painting. The torchlight beam picked out only the dog’s eager muzzle, pricked ears and prying paw, together with Gino’s probing fingers and the fallen leaves of the hazelnut tree beneath which the truffle presumably lurked. Everything else around was totally obscured.

There weren’t huge numbers of truffles, and most were too small to sell, (and black into the bargain, less prized in Piedmont than the famous white varieties) but there were certainly enough to whet my truffling appetite. Gino tenderly wrapped a precious handful of tiny tubers in a paper napkin for me; Mario gave instructions first on how to keep them (brush carefully with a toothbrush, bury them in rice in a glass jar and store in the fridge for up to 10 days) and then how to cook them (peel and shave over pasta, or scrambled eggs, or melted Fontina, and press the peelings into service for a fragrant sugo for pasta).

A final word of warning: should you too be lucky enough to acquire a truffle or three on your travels, make sure they are imprisoned in a well-sealed screwtop jar before you set off for home. Mario once offered to transport some, along with a consignment of wine, to a client in Belgium. The truffles were not as hermetically sealed as they might have been and for the entire 1000-kilometre journey from Perno to Antwerp, he was assailed by the sheer, overpowering animal spirits of the tartufi.

Worse, when Mario emerged at his destination he was promptly surrounded, Pied Piper-like, by what seemed like the town’s entire canine population. It took the return journey with the windows open most of the way to exorcise the musky scent from the van. The experience has quite cured him of his fondness for truffles. Just as well, at the sort of prices they fetch.

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