Truffle Fever

"This stuff exudes pure evil, a debilitating scent that deserves no place in the human intestinal tract." So says Larry Plim of the Vancover Sun. However after cooking up some truffles with scrambled eggs, cheddar cheese and black pepper, he goes on to add, "That something so nasty smelling can taste so subtle once cooked, can complement the meal so effectively - is perplexing."

The holiday season is upon us, and for those looking for something different and exotic to serve while entertaining, truffles, especially white ones, may be the answer -- if you can afford them.

At over $2,000 a pound, white truffles are among the rarest and most expensive foods in the world. Costing more than gold, truffles are a fungus that grows underground without apparent roots, stem leaf, fruit or sunlight, yet is coveted by gourmets throughout the world.

Truffles are formed in the fall when the fungus magnatum pico takes root under the soil in the roots of oak and hazelnut tress. They draw carbohydrates from the trees and use them to build filaments in a web of ever-expanding fingers to reproduce.

The high cost of truffles is due in part to the difficulty in cultivating and finding them. Growing primarily in France and Italy, truffles need just the right kind of soil, sun and time to develop. These conditions are met on the hillsides around the Mediterranean and practically nowhere ele.

While efforts have been made to grow them commercially, success has been limited. Generations of farmers and scientists have tried and failed to replicate the mystery of this underground fungus. A hoard of truffles may lie under one tree, but there won't be any under the tree right next to it. No one knows why.

In addition, it doesn't help that expanding farms and deforestation have been swallowing up the truffles' natural habitat. When Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821) needed wood for his warships he started cutting down oak trees, according to The Joy of Truffles by Otwad Buchner. Before that, France had been producing as much as 2,000 tons a year. Recent harvests have yielded as few as 60 tons.

And, unlike the search for mushrooms, truffle hunting takes years of skill, patience and hands on practice. There are few identification books for guidance.

"I don't know what makes it so special. I guess because it is hard to grow, it is expensive, and because it is expensive it probably makes it taste nicer," says Australian Tim Terry.

"The most delicious of all foods anywhere," adds Elizabeth David, author of Italian Food.

While raw, unripe truffles don't have much of a flavor, connoisseurs can smell a small ripe truffle from across a crowded room. But it's heat that truly brings the flavor out. It's almost never served by itself and is harder to cook with than caviar of foie gras. A few shavings are all that is needed to add a little bit of heaven to a meal.

According to Jean-Louis Fioc of France, "You cannot define the smell of a truffle. It is magic."

For Urbani Tartuffi - a family run business that handles 70 percent of the world's truffle market - this holiday season could be one for the record books. It's estimated that the cost of white truffles could rise to as much as $3,000 in December.

As French novelist Alexander Dumas once wrote, "when I eat truffles, I become livelier, happier, I feel refreshed. I feel inside me, especially in my veins, a soft voluptuous heat that quickly reaches my head. My ideas are clearer and easier."

And, at $3,000 a pound, as much should be expected.