Restaurant chefs and gourmands are discovering that you don't have to spend a fortune on French or Italian truffles. Fine truffles to accent a special meal can be foraged in the wild right here in the Northwest. Just to be clear, we're talking about the fungus, not the chocolate candy. But it takes a good nose to locate a ripe truffle in the ground. For that you need a "truffle dog," which conveniently, are now being trained locally.
You might be as excited as Mia MacCollin of Bend if your pet showed an aptitude to find buried treasure. And treasure it is. The native Oregon white truffle can fetch several hundred dollars per pound at retail.
"Find it!" Mia tells her black lab mix named "Boston". The two are finishing a two day course in truffle foraging at a Douglas fir plantation south of Salem. MacCollin and fifteen other dog owners have each paid nearly $600 to attend.
In France, truffle hunters historically relied on the keen noses of pigs. Italy is home to a special breed of truffle dog. In this country, a small cadre of dog trainers and truffle lovers are promoting the use of all sorts of breeds.
"We had poodles. We had a pit bull. We had a labradoodle. We had a papillon (a toy spaniel), couple of labs, a golden retriever..." says Deb Walker.
She's a trainer and says a dog sure beats a clumsy rake to uncover truffles. But it can take up to a year to fully train a truffle dog. Although as we're seeing here, some can pick up the basics in a matter of days.
"It's easy to teach a dog the truffle scent and to find it," Walker says. "The hard part is teaching the dog to tell you when he's found it, not to eat it when he's found it, to keep working for an hour or two."
Truffle lovers have difficulty describing the earthy allure of the forest fruit. The underground mushrooms can range from the size of a pea to a golf ball. They remind Gold Beach, Oregon chef and tree farm owner Janet Snazuk of the nuances of fine wine.
"The taste is like nothing that you've ever experienced," Snazuk says. "It's got an oil that permeates and stays with you. It's exotic."
Snazuk says her husband paid the training course tuition as a present to her and her big black guard dog. It sounds like a present that could reap dividends.
"My hopes are that I can take her on my woodlot that is managed like this and has duff like this and go find truffles just for me, not to sell, not to have a business," Snazuk says. "Just for me and my husband and some select friends."
Most of the dog owners here along with Snazuk say they're trying this for recreation. (doggy command in Italian: "Lavore! Lavore!") Instructor Jim Sanford is the only one using Italian commands, in honor of his Italian truffle dog "Tom." Sanford, of Tennessee's Blackberry Farm, foresees growing demand for trained K-9's.
"The truffle industry - if you can call it that - here in the Northwest, we've barely scratched the surface," he says. "There's a huge abundance of truffles and there will be a huge need for truffle dogs. I think it's going to get exponentially more popular."
In fact, growing interest in the culinary delight has spawned a variety of new farm and canine enterprises in the Northwest. Professional harvester Alana McGee of Seattle estimates about 50 landowners have planted "European-style" truffle plantations around the region over the past decade. Her own business to serve them is called Toil & Truffle.
