Golden year for truffles, good quality and slashed prices

Cursed be the spring rains, which disheartened vine and olive growers, who found themselveswith a halved harvest and diseased plants. Blessed are the spring rains, however, now that it is truffle season, never as abundant, fragrant and affordable as this year.

The golden year of the truffle

To call a product that costs hundreds or thousands of euros per kilo affordable may seem paradoxical. But the truth is that prices are roughly half of those of last year, the black year of the white gold, and its enthusiasts will be able to make up for the prohibitive gluttony in 2022. In fact,the Tuber Magnatum Pico needs, both in germination and ripening, damp and fresh soil, feeding
on water and minerals that it absorbs from the roots of the trees with which it lives in symbiosis, mainly oaks, holm oaks, pines and cork trees, which provide it with different and distinctive
characteristics. So far, the year has been ideal for the mushroom. And perhaps it is worth takingadvantage of this early part of the season to buy a few fragrant nuggets, before the unusual heat advantage of this early part of the season to buy a few fragrant nuggets, before the unusual heat of this faux autumn spoils everything.

Acqualagna smiles, high quality in San Maniato

Naturally, the situation is different in the various areas. In Acqualagna, in the Marche region, the truffle exchange currently records prices ranging from 1,500 to 3,000 euros per kilo depending on the size (it is known that the most prized truffles are those over fifty grams), while black summer truffles range from 450 to 600 euros. Last year, a large white truffle fetched up to 5,000 euro per kilo. The situation is also excellent in the other truffle capitals of the Marche, from Sant'Angelo in Vado to Pergola, with prices of around 1,000 euro per kilo for the prized white. Let's move on to Tuscany, to San Miniato, where quality is looming very high and prices range from 1,500 euro for the smallest truffles, weighing just a few dozen grams, to 2,500-3,000 for the big ones, even if the “harvest” so far is not so abundant due to the very low rainfall in recent weeks. We arrive in Emilia, at Savigno, in Valsamoggia. Expectations are high here, even if the first prices, from 3,000 to 4,000 euros per kilo for the largest sizes of the prized white, and from 400 to 500 euros for the black, are not very far from those of last year, although in the event of abundance they are bound to fall.

Alba and the rest of Italy

And here we are in Alba, the nation’s capital of the white truffle. The website truffle.com, which serves as an online marketplace for the tuber but also as an information platform and a network
between truffle hunters, currently records average prices for the Tuber Magnatum Pico of 3,137 euro per kilo for pieces over 50 grams, 2,165 for pieces between 20 and 50 grams and 1,195 for
pieces under 10 grams. Last year, the quotation was close to 7,000 euro in the first ten days of November, remaining well above 5,000 euro throughout the season and only dropping a little at
the end of the season, between December and January. There are no quotations available for the other “truffle” regions, from Umbria to Latium, from Abruzzo to Molise, Basilicata and Calabria,
but the trend appears to be the same: it will be a very fragrant year.

by Andrea Cuomo