Have you considered roast pheasant with your Nebbiolo for the holiday meal? If not, perhaps you should, because what was shaping up as a late and brief white truffle season is now looking like a total bust. There are relatively few truffles to be found, and they are generally small and of relatively poor quality, some suitably aromatic but flavorless. To top it all off, the prices have remained firm at 3,500-4,000 euros per kilo, at a time when the price would normally fall to the 2,200/kilo range. If you see offers in the U.S., they will almost certainly not be Piemontese, and I am not aware of any place in Eastern Europe where the weather has been any more favorable for truffle growth. I am told that local ristoranti soaked up most of the output here, but also that their patrons were not often happy with price or quality. I had three great meals out of one batch of truffles in early November, a dreadful few last week and my truffle man is trying to find a few for my lunch guests tomorrow, but he can promise nothing, and he is saying that it looks like this will be the end of the season. Into every life, too little rain must fall! Maybe this all bodes well for the wine, but at my age, I would rather have the truffles…
Saddest post I’ve ever read.
Saddest post that I have ever written.
Like your parents used to say while spanking you (back in the Dark Ages when properly and effectively disciplining your child was neither abuse nor felonious), “this hurts me more than it hurts you”. As you know me to be a creature of enlightened self-interest, you know that is true! Tarocco blood oranges will be here any day now, and there is always panettone, but those things are best enjoyed AFTER one has had one’s fill of tartufi bianchi. At least we know that if Parker makes his annual Hedonist Gazette post about Primizie Fine Foods having just delivered 2 pounds of top-quality truffles that he will either be lying, or his nose and his palate have deteriorated beyond salvation…
You have a truffle man?
I have a guy who gives me fries with my order, but it’s not quite the same.
geez, yeah, no kidding. I didn’t realize how bad I had it… !
![[wow.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/7/7d450e9830889c8943b674446a21b7254cad657e.gif "wow"){kind=small}
UGH!
I have been patiently waiting for black Friday white truffle sale. Looks like that is going to happen. Well as they say in baseball. Wait until next year.
It is not so special. I have to share the guy with Gerard Depardieu and the occasional (Mercedes)busload of Russian oligarchs in recent years (although the price of oil seems to have put a stop to peripatetic oligarchs this year). (I worry that I will run into Depardieu there and he will pee on my leg, mistaking me for a flight attendant or something.) And in a disasterous year like this one, when the season started late, ended early, cost too much and delivered too little, my man does not give me fries with my order. In fact, today, he could not even give me my order…
Oh well, life goes on. The refrain over here is “paper or plastic”, and what’s this “black Friday” business? You’re in It-ly where they don’t celebrate it.
Bad news indeed. My wine group’s 11th annual white truffle dinner is coming up next weekend and while we are still going forward it sounds like we will be in for an expensive disappointment… Hopefully the direct source in Piedmont we order from will manage to find some decent ones.
For your sake, I hope so, but if you are Catholic, and especially if you are not, I suppose, it is Hail, Mary time! 
No, we have finally been infected by it here, but the absence of Walmarts has confined its spread mainly to online sources. (It would be cultural anathema at a minimum, and perhaps even illegal in some jurisdictions, to open a store at 12:01AM.) The Brits, on the other hand, have embraced the phenomenon as America once embraced the Beatles and the Stones. Talk about not celebrating things, however, my Thanksgiving dinner this year was an assortment of iconic and nuanced artisanal wurstel imported from the Alto Adige, served with an outstanding kraut from Germany, a yellow mustard imported from France and Carnegie Deli mustard imported from, well, Carnegie Deli. (Well, not actually Carnegie Deli, since it was shut down for stealing electricity from its neighbors (or ConEd). Imported from the Carnegie Deli In Exile mail-order operation in New Jersey. I do not care where in the hell it came from. It still tasted like Carnegie Deli to me. All that was missing was a hot pastrami on rye, a schmear of chopped liver and a cheeky waitress…)
We just had a white truffle dinner, and it was great. I can’t say I’m a specialist in white truffles though, but the aroma was wonderful
Ashish, that has been the M.O. this year…sometimes great aroma, but no flavor…
Are you taking applications for a new truffle man? I don’t have any secret sources for delicious fungi, but OTOH, you won’t have to share me with Gerard Depardieu. I’m also willing to perform valet services for a nominal fee.
+1
I think you misspelled “varlet.”
It was often said that poor truffle season = great wine season and vice-versa
Bill, I am feeling your pain. I’ve had one lone exceptional experience this season, and probably didn’t need your depressing post to manage my already low expectations going forward. I assume you’re dealing with the problem by drinking really good stuff. Care to report?
Post of the day! Corey had to look it up. Bill winked.