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An Oregon truffle
If you're looking for the candy kind of truffles, stop right now - I'm talking about the fungal kind! Forest truffles are actually a mushroom, but an unusual one; a mushroom that grows under the ground. That fact makes them especially difficult to find, because you can't see them. Truffles in Italy and France often fetch hundreds of dollars for a good one - they are a culinary treasure that few can even truthfully admit to ever tasting. But surprisingly, truffles the near equal to those from Europe are found right here in the U.S. Would you like to find a few? Stick with me for a few minutes, and I'll let you in on a few truffle secrets. Remember, truffles are the world's most expensive single food ingredient - but you can find them for free!
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[*]The first secret of finding truffles is that if you try finding them all by yourself, you probably won't be successful. Finding truffles requires having a few animal friends! OK, so you already knew that they train dogs to find truffles - and with their acute sense of smell, dogs are especially good at this task. Hold that thought, and in a minute, I'll tell you how you too can train your own dog to find truffles. But surprisingly, other animals can be helpful too.
[*]The second secret of truffle hunting is knowing that once you get into the forest and begin looking for truffles, you'll need the help of that other animal - forest voles, or mice. It seems that voles, squirrels, and chipmunks love truffles too, and if you look for evidence that they've been looking in a certain area, that's a good tip off that you'll find truffles there too. Truffles, like other mushrooms, often grow in clusters quite close to each other - so if you find one, you may find more close by. And voles will often uproot a ripe truffle, and simply leave it there! Why? Who knows? But most eatable truffles are too big for a vole to finish - so often, you'll find a nice truffle with a few nibbles gone - Take it!
A rodent nibbled truffle
[*]The third secret of finding truffles is that like many mushrooms, the truffle has an affinity to certain forest trees - in other words, if you can find a particular kind of tree, you can probably up your chances of finding the kind of truffles that grow under that tree. Depending on where you live in the U.S., the tree/truffle relationship will be different. Here in the Northwest, the trees I look for are young Douglas firs (BLM plots, Christmas tree farms, etc.) Check the Resource section below, where I've included a site which discusses the affinity of specific trees and specific truffles (yes, there are many kinds of truffles - too many!).
[*]The fourth secret of finding truffles is that they are always found quite close to the surface of the ground. This is good for the various animals that are looking for them - and it's good for us too! I mention this because some truffle hunters go into the woods armed with rakes, and indiscriminately begin to turn over the forest floor until the area looks like a battle scene. Please learn early to never use this method - it is generally ineffective - almost every truffle you find will be unripe! And it ruins the forest floor and the delicate mycelium (the vegetative body of all forest mushrooms), growing just under the surface of the forest floor) for any future mushrooms or truffles. In all honesty, if you use a rake like a butcher in the woods, you may be killed right there by other trufflers or mushroomers! It's that serious!
[*]Now as the fifth secret of finding truffles, let me share with you the absolute best way to probe for truffles - with your bare hand! Not with any tool of any kind, just your bare hand. Remember, you're looking for evidence that animals have disturbed the forest floor (small areas of pushed up earth, and small holes in the duff). When you find such an area, push your hand under the surrounding duff, and with your fingertips, feel around for a hard, ball shaped object, generally the size of a walnut or a ping-pong ball. There may be only one, and maybe the vole has taken a few nibbles out of it - so what! Maybe there's more than one - just keep feeling around the area. When you are done, try to pull the cover of duff back into place. Yes, even your hand has done some damage, so try to leave the area as much like you found it as possible. Please practice responsible truffling.
[*]So, you've found what you think is a truffle, and you've heard that ripe truffles have a smell - so you smell it. If it's really ripe and eatable, it should have a rich, earthy, garlicky, pungent smell (some think the aroma is wonderful, others think it's funky). But you may not smell anything - often, conditions in the woods are cold and wet during truffle season, and your truffle may need to warm up before it gives off its smell. Take it home and smell it again - still not much smell? Wrap it in paper towel, and put it in the fridge for a week or so - often it'll ripen there - however, if it's just too young, it won't get any riper. But if it soon fills your refrigerator with that beautiful or funky truffle smell - congratulations! Start looking for some truffle recipes.
[*]If your truffle came from the Northwest woods and has a strong, pungent aroma, it is likely one of the highly prized ones - it may be a Tuber gibbosum(Jan-Jun) or Tuber oregonense(Oct-Jan), commonly called an Oregon white truffle. The outside color of these begin as a white, unripe and small truffle - as it grows, it may take on a more orange tone, eventually turning a brownish tan - it may get as large as a golf ball. If your smelly truffle is black, larger than a golf ball, and knobby shaped, it's likely a Leucangium carthusianum(Sep-Feb), or Oregon black truffle. If your truffle has little or no smell, it is either unripe, or not an eatable variety. Another way to determine if you have a real truffle is to cut it in half - all of the eatable truffles noted above have solid cores with unique, beautiful marbling throughout. See noted below under Resources, for both keys to identification, and pictures of hundreds of truffles - yours will be there.
A beautiful Oregon black truffle
[*]Your best use of this first truffle, especially if it has a rich, pungent smell (or even one that is rotten!), is to use it to train your dog to find more truffles. How? Place the truffle in the toe of an old cotton sock, along with some other stuffing (some trainers like to use an old 35mm film canister instead). Use it to play "hide and seek" with your dog - make sure you reinforce letting the dog smell the sock between each search. Use a command, like "Get the truffle!" each time. Dogs like things that have pungent smells - your dog should enjoy the search. Remember to reward - food and praise - for each success, and make the search harder and harder - always using the command, "Get the truffle!" Eventually, you can move the game outside, where you can bury the sock in the ground or under pine needles. Keep the sock in the fridge - eventually it will get VERY ripe, but your dog will love it! Once your dog gets good at this game, take him/her out to the woods for the real thing. A good truffle dog is the answer to consistently finding plenty of ripe, eatable truffles - a great investment![/list]
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