There is a team of truffle hunters in Portugal. Does valuable “fruit” have a future in the country?
A part of Portuguese territory has conditions for the development of truffles, a fungus that grows along the roots of some trees. For the first time, there is a team of truffle hunting dogs looking for this much appreciated food from Italian cuisine.
“give, lola“, “dai, laika“, is what you hear most in a day with the team that includes Giovanni and the dogs. They came from Italy to look for truffles in Portugal at the invitation of Chef Tanka Sapkota, who has been working with truffles for 30 years.
There are numerous species of this fungus, but not all are edible. The purpose of this prospecting is to find black or bianchetto truffles, truffles of lesser value when discovered with an exclusive white truffle found in the Alba region of Italy.
Despite Tanka Sapkota’s optimism, the Chef admits that finding this guy would be “a miracle“, so the focus is really on the black truffle.”It already mobilized a lot, we would have cleaner forests, the ecology would be functional and the local economy would change completely“, he explains.
Part of the country has accepted conditions for the development of this fungus underground. Calcareous soils, neutral or alkaline pH and suitable vegetation and climate are required. It will be a piece of the country, in Beira Litoral, from Serra de Sicó to Serra d’Aire e Candeeiros, on the doorstep of Lisbon.
Forests without economic use could become “exploitation in its own right, with as much income as eucalyptus”, as explained by Pedro Bingre do Amaral, who adds that it would be possible to resolve what I summarize as squaring the circle: conserving nature and boost the region’s economy.
The professor of forest engineering, environmental engineering and land use planning is one of the specialists enthusiastic about the project who ended up joining the team in the field. Some of the collected truffles were sent to the University of Évora, where a researcher also came to meet Tanka, Giovanni and the rest of the team.
They found some red truffle. It is edible and has a good flavor, explains Tanka, it is even used in Italy, but it has little commercial value because it has to be consumed in a short time (less than 3 days).
The size of those that have been collected would not allow cooking a dish to the height, even on the very day they are removed from the ground. Last summer’s drought will have stopped the development of truffles, and, on the other hand, the rain of the last few days could also be making the work of Lola and Laika difficult, as they sniff the ground diligently.
The aroma is felt at the surface, but the truffles are deep down, next to the roots of trees such as oaks, chestnuts or hazelnuts, with which they create a symbiotic relationship – to the advantage of both organisms.
Truffles are collected by dogs, trained from an early age to work, and preferred to pigs, who tend to eat what they find. In Italy, this is an activity that becomes dangerous due to the competitiveness that the product economy creates. Hunting is done at night and in the greatest possible secrecy so that other hunters do not know where the truffles were found. Therefore, dogs do not bark, they use muzzles to avoid poisoning, and after the search, the earth is replaced to erase traces.
From land to table
The regions of Alba, in Piedmont, give rise to the most desired and most expensive. A specialist can tell by the aroma where the truffles are from, notices the nuances between the smell of summer and winter. A big question, “the dream“, as Chef Tanka exclaims, is knowing how Portuguese truffles will smell.
From science, it makes sense that truffles of economic interest are developed in Portugal. If the team doesn’t find it this time, they can repeat the prospecting around April, when another type of truffle ripens. But if, even so, they do not reach that time, there is still hope by replicating the natural process in the laboratory.
It is already being done in Spain and is showing results after 4 to 6 years of planting, but in Portugal the path has already begun to be followed. Patrícia Figueiredo is a researcher at GreenClon and came to meet the team in Ansião, Leiria, to show a juvenile specimen of strawberry tree with infection by the fungus tuber melanosporum already developing. The mycorrhizae that show on the roots will evolve to be black truffles if the conditions in the ground were as indicated. And we know that there is, in Beira Litoral.
Strawberry tree is one of the trees where the fungus was unlikely to develop. Therefore, in trees such as oak, pine or black poplar, naturally in the Portuguese landscape, it will be possible to apply the method and recover the economic interest that has been lost.