an article with the Barcelona truffle tour notes taken by Jan O’Connell & Fred Harden 2016 < thinktag >

1. Tour Notes January - February 2016

2. DRY?
Call that paddock of yours a truffière? Now this is a truffière -Finca El Olmar, Manzanera, Teruel. Catalonia.
T
here’s a select group of Aus-
tralian growers who first met
Marcos Morcillo when he was
an official guest at the 2014
ATGA Conference in Launceston. His
talk was called Paradigm shifts in
growing truffles, and the slide pre-
sentation is on your members web-
site. (Without the audio it isn’t easy
to follow). And some of you may have
seen his just as disruptive ‘10 tips for
growing truffles’ Skype video session
at Truffle Melbourne Festival last year.
He is a co-partner of Micologia Forestal
& Aplicada (MF&A) a private research
centre specialising in truffles and
mushrooms, and he and his colleagues
work closely with the Research Insti-
tute of Agronomic Technology (IRTA).
He wrote his first book on truffle grow-
ing for the Spanish Government, and
you’ll have seen news of the release of
his latest book Truffle Farming Today.
He knows what he’s talking about, he
consults around the world and gener-
ously shares all of that information in
his book and on his English and Spanish
language blogs. As we quickly found,
it’s not his nature to make pronounce-
ments about how best to do some-
thing. Knowing about the variability of
the growing process he always says,
“This is what we believe is the best way
now” and with a grin, ”ask me again
next week”.
His success has made him a magnet
for information and he is very aware of
what is changing quickly with new re-
search and practical results.
As research for the GROW wiki project,
Jan and I took the opportunity to join his
tour with a group of 16 growers or po-
tential growers from eight countries, in-
cluding Bulgaria, Mexico, Chile, and Aus-
tralia in January. We went to learn about
that latest research Marcos and his
colleagues have conducted, visit truf-
fle growers, distributors and processors
to see what he believes are best-prac-
tice operations in Spain. Our task now
is to extract what we believe was rele-
vant for Australian growers and these
notes (and the videos to follow) is the
first result. I’ve shared this with Marcos
to ensure we are reporting accurately.
When we arrived, we discovered that
it had been a bad season for truffle in
Spain, with above-average winter tem-
peratures and no rain for more than 100
days. While truffles were still being har-
vested, yields were down and the truffle
was coming exclusively from the irrigat-
ed plantations – hunters were finding no
wild truffle at all, predicting the season
would finish early.
That also meant that as tourists
we had great sunny weather.
We did see a lot of truffle however. The
average annual output of Spain is 40
tonnes, compared to Australia’s best
guess at 8 tonnes. Spain is second only
to France in the production of tuber mel-
anosporum, although after centuries of
Marcos asked how long I had had
my truffière, and when I said “I’m
not a grower, I’m just a groupie” he
replied “Great. That makes it easy.
If you want to start now, with what
we know, I could really help you
grow truffles”.
FREDHARDEN&JANO’CONNELL
Happyastwopigsinmycorrhiza

3. wild harvesting, there is still not a truffle
eating tradition there.
This means that most of the product is
exported. In contrast to Australia, their
exportmarketsarejustafew hoursaway.
There were small ‘Trufa for sale’ signs
in deli windows but we only saw fresh
truffle on sale in the retail markets in
Barcelona and Teruel, the price was
€1000 (approx. $AUD 1500) a kilo.
Caldes de Montbui
The tour began at Caldes de Montbui in
the hills near Barcelona. At an evening
briefing session participants introduced
themselves and were presented with
their workbooks and an impressive, dag-
ger-like implement – the only approved
tool for digging truffle in Spain. (It was
alsowell suited forthe soiltypeswe saw.)
addition of spore-containing sub-
strates via ‘Spanish wells’ holes or
in ripped furrows. The idea that you
will have to constantly monitor the
growth of mycorrhiza over the life of
your plantation caused some re-eval-
uation by the growers present.
Knowing the soporific effect of Pow-
erPoint in a warm room with an open
fire, the lecture sessions were inten-
sive, then followed by practical visits.
A tour of the nursery greenhouses and
experimental plots, and then with visits
to truffle traders and processors. And
somehow always finding time for
a good lunch.
For Jan and I, the trader visits were
a highlight, giving a context to the
European truffle business that look-
ing at a foreign website can never do.
The Spanish traders buy from both wild
hunters and growers, regularly travel-
ling all over Spain to do collections, of-
ten in local bars. This was the way truf-
fles had traditionally been bought and
the dealer would be presented with a
basket of unwashed truffle (often con-
taining stones). It is only recently that
daily prices have been determined by
the quality of individual truffles and the
demand. There are still markets where
you can buy truffle, often sight unseen,
for cash at that week’s going rate.
One of the biggest traders, Laumont,
was instrumental in setting up a more
manageable system that required sell-
ers to trust the company’s grading
judgement (there was always some
conversation on arrival) and guaran-
teed them payment within days after
the truffle was cleaned and graded.
Each grower was supplied with a de-
tailed spreadsheet showing weight, the
percentage of dirt and the percentage
of each grade of truffle with the going
rates that day for each. They shared
some of their real world spreadsheets.
While hard for them to introduce, they
now have a 300+ suppliers and the
practice has been accepted by even
conservative traditional wild hunters.
The only difference I saw in the grad-
ing process, compared with our grading
truffles here, was purely the emphasis
on size. We were allowed to sniff and
examine some trays of truffle, checking
blackness from the nicks and said, ‘yes a
great truffle AND I agree it’s pretty’. Our
discussion (at the last ATGA Conference
for example) as to what constitutes a
premium grade truffle differs slightly
because we have very different expec-
tations as our small growers enter the
market. “I’ve got a 500 gram premium
truffle, it’s a bit lumpy but smells ter-
rific, why isn’t it considered A-grade?”
For the European market if it’s not small
(golfball to tennis ball) and round-ish, it
doesn’t make that top price. It is usually
cut or broken and sold not as fresh pre-
mium pieces but for canning.
The Truffle & Wine Co. said that fresh
pieces are a growing part of their
local and export market. Cheap-
er than whole truffle, being
just as good in aroma and ripeness
it is preferred by many of our chefs.
Do I look like a terrorist? There
were subsequently some misun-
derstandings with the Spanish Rail-
ways about my gift. Understandably
touchy about terrorist attacks, the
X-ray scan clearly showed a huge
broad bladed knife in my suitcase. It
had gone through two early scans,
probably on edge and mixed with
my tripod gear so I was surprised
when I was asked to open the bag.
The staff recoiled in disbelief as I
brandished it, and even explaining
it was a government approved ag-
ricultural tool for digging the trufa
didn’t help. When I said I was go-
ing to Barcelona, they shook their
heads and confiscated it, trying to
supress their grins.
The tour group in front of the IRTA in Torre
Marimon, a tastefully restored period building.
The first two mornings of the trip con-
sisted of classroom sessions at the Cat-
alan Government owned Research In-
stitute of Agronomic Technology (IRTA).
There were discussions on truffle ecol-
ogy, soils, feeding behaviour and a lot
of time was spent on the necessity to
understand and ensure the persistence
of the two mating types during the pro-
ductive life of the truffière. The research
has showed how that changes over time
and some trees become dominant in
one type only. They have good brulees
but with no chance of growing a truffle.
The other research of growing impor-
tance is the understanding that it is
soil bacteria that contributes much to
the unique truffle aroma and good soil
structure is essential.
One thing that quickly became clear
was the dynamic and ongoing nature
of the Spanish/Catalan research. The
answers to a lot of our questions were
“we’re working on it” or “we’ve planted
to test that and we’ll know definitively
in five years or so”. Nonetheless, Marcos
and his IRTA colleagues summarised
the latest science and presented ex-
amples of successful practices includ-
ing soil preparation, irrigation meth-
ods and the growing importance of the
Truffle trading
The mushroom and truffle stall at the Barcelona
La Boqueria Market
The extensive greenhouses of the IRTA
Manjares de la tierra owners Maria Jesus , Lola and Mercedes
What was apparent as we visited the
traders was how viability of the local
industry is boosted by the ability of
the traders to offer processing. Broken
or insect damaged premium truffle as
well as lesser grade truffle is canned,
juiced, frozen or dried. These products,
depending on whether they’re first, sec-
ond or even third boiling, are all clearly
marked, (a legal requirement) are sold to
chefs or used by industry in a range of
packaged goods. They all mentioned the
concern for food safety by the chefs and
corporate buyers (big hotel groups) as
reason to purchase the tinned product.
One of the successful traders we visited,
Manjares de la tierra, had a nice story.
They have become active value-added
producers and is run by a group of three
woman, wives of local truffle producers.
They could see that their truffle they
were selling for a lower price for ‘pro-
cessing’ was then given a higher value
by value-adding. So they decided to
cut out the middle men. They produce
a range of jars and small tinned truffle
products with combinations that I’ve
never seen on shelves here.
Pastes with mushrooms, summer truf-
fle (not black) and duck foie gras, vac-
uum packed risotto rice with dried truf-
fle slices. We were given a ‘show bag’ of
items (thank you) and have tasted our
way through them (Yes, declaring them
to disinterested customs officers on our
return to Melbourne. And yes I scrubbed
my shoes ma’am even if you didn’t ask).
There is little chance
for any bacterial
contaminants when the
truffle is sealed in a tin
and autoclaved.The standard plant container allows examination
at any stages of the growth and easy planting.
Perfect shape black truffle and perfect shape truf-
fle vacuum packed and snap frozen ( -16 deg )

4. Marcos said that the Spanish chefs were
largely truffle agnostic. There’s a local
truffle lunch special, truffled fried eggs
and Jamon on this blackboard menu, it’s
a dish that is apparently available each
season in local bars around Teruel. Sim-
ple but I didn’t get to try it. Next time.
However the first full day of the lec-
tures and trader visits was capped
off by a late lunch – a lunch that last-
ed from 3pm until 7pm. Nandu Juba-
ny is a Michelin starred chef who
understands truffle and demonstrat-
ed this via nine amazing courses.
A special truffled menu is offered
as an option each winter Jan
writes about that here.
The mini-bus was now covering long
distances. We saw the sun rise and
set over foggy landscapes a couple of
times. On Day 3, the group moved on
to Teruel, high in the mountains west
of Valencia. This area produces most
of Spain’s black truffle. We’d all packed
our thermal underwear, being led to
expect temperatures down to -7o. We
needn’t have bothered – the weath-
er continued to be unseasonably mild.
At the old Teruel railway station of Mora
there is the largest truffle market in
Spain, (it is held every Friday night in the
station bar).Whilewewerethere, truffles
were fetching between €350 and €600
/ kilo. On Saturday 9th January in Teruel
the price was between €420 and €515.
Marcos explains to us on the bus, here
(if you’re online).
Around Teruel, we visited two success-
ful truffle orchards. Here the learning
ramped up with practical examples and
Q&A. The largest of these covered 35
hectares and is owned by Miguel Pérez.
Situated in a valley, the scale of Finca El
Olmo drew gasps from inside the bus as
we breasted the hill. Clearly a successful
business, there where large traditional
style buildings and modern machinery
sheds filled with new equipment. The
50 hectare property of holm oaks has
a network of Wireless remote moisture
sensors and irrigation is centrally con-
trolled. The best areas he says are pro-
ducing 200kg a hectare, average yield is
about 100kg per hectare a year.
We followed one hunter around in a pad-
dock near to the main buildings (setup
with large function rooms for ‘wedings
parties, anything’ events. Trufiturismo
is big here). No warnings about com-
paction from all of us stomping around,
(we were considered a ‘special’ group)
or bio-security, which Marcos says is the
approach across Spain. “They already
have all the pests and diseases” and
contamination of species is common
from an area that had wild truffles.
They start with scrupulously washed
(first by machine, then by hand) truf-
fle that is pressure sealed in a large tin
and cooked in an industrial autoclave
pressure cooker. Truffles, having a high
moisture content as you know, the re-
sulting juice is considerable. Some of
the truffle is removed, going into smaller
tins and marketed as ‘first boiling’. The
juice is also canned. A few teaspoons
of water and salt is added if needed,
and a second ‘boiling’ and sometimes
a third is repeated. The result is tasted,
the product is adjusted for consistent
flavour in each tin, and then is packed
into 500g, one and two kilo tins for sale.
The taste consistency is taken very se-
riously, blending graded truffle so that a
chef opening a tin, can expect the same
aroma and flavour each time. Apparent-
ly some chefs prefer that cooked truffle
aroma. Restaurants and ‘industry’ get
the first process (in French it’s marked
1ère cuisson or ‘first boil’), second and
third pressure cooking are what we’ll
find on retail shelves (or from websites).
One writer says “Beware. The truffle
does subsequently lose a lot of aroma,
but the price tag does not go down!”
We were told the price for tinned prod-
uct has been stable for years. Growers
get €150 a kilo or less for truffle used for
canning, often for what we would con-
sider premium truffle pieces. However
they sell all the truffle they bring in, and
are paid at the different grading rates.
‘Truffle a la papillote with Brussels sprouts’ being
served at Can Jubany at Calldetenes, Catalonia
Bocata del dia-Daily menu
Are you ready to sell your
truffle for $200 a kilo?
Rip first, ask questions afterward. Uniformly positive results have been gained by
ripping along the rows at El Olmo, they were set er, as deep as the photo. (Top)
(Below) Vibrating tillers (set to about 10cm deep) are run over the rows, as close
as they can get to the trees without damage after all truffles are gathered and
before pruning. This reduces weed growth. Marcos reports much improved pro-
ductivity with both methods. The spread of mating types seems to be part of this,
and truffle is always found along the looser soil of the rip-line.
Jordi Serentill with tins of truffle ready for process
The 2016 tour group with Julio Perales (with hat, black iPad in hand connected to irrigation
data) and his son is the handler carrying a large knee pad, with dog.
Has anyone factored long term return
on investment of an Australia truffière
with a percentage of the crop at that
tinned produce price?
When canned, melanosporum, brumale
and indicum look exactly the same: they
all lose their white veins and the flesh
becomes uniformly black. Which must
make it a temptation to mix the produce
to reach a consitency even if the rules
say no fake aroma is added.
The first boil juice itself is very aromatic
and full of the glutamates, it’s a premi-
um product used primarily for sauces.
As we arrived at Conservas Coll, a wild hunter
had just delivered this plastic bag of very scrap-
py but pungent truffle. More so than the farmed
beside it.
Teruel - truffle capital

5. On the following day we met Julio
Perales (below), president of the Tereul
Truffle Growers Association at our hotel
and he travelled with us to his plantation
Mora de Rubielos. The truffière has
mixed deciduous Quercus faginea and
evergreen Quercus ilex. Located at an
altitude of 1050m, the plantation is cur-
rently 12-14 years old. His range of soil
types dictates yeild, he is getting an
average 100kg per hectare a year on the
deeper more fertile soil.
Julio is fastidious about soil compaction.
Tasks like pruning and weed control
(vibra-tilling) are all timed to the soil
moisture but sometimes he feels the
soil is too damp to run a tractor over
for ‘Spanish well’ trenching. On the day
we were there, he had a hunter and
dog with a second worker following up
to add handfuls of the substrate to the
hole after the truffles were removed.
See the video below.
It also meant that we didn’t go
into the paddock as a group.
Both plantations employed teams of
three or four hunters with the aim
to visit every tree once a week. The
dogs are kept in large kennels. Pera-
les has thirteen dogs for three hunters.
The dogs were worked for two-hour
stretches, then replaced and spelled.
During the working season, the only
food they are given were the treats
Dog food (looks good). Fred food (looks better)
when they found a truffle (perhaps giv-
en more generously than our better fed
dogs in Australia). And as Jan said, I bet
none of them got to sleep on the bed!
Start with limestone sand like this. Wait centuries for soil. Plant truffle trees
Video available online only.

6. Discussion points
It’s clear that our knowledge and un-
derstanding of how truffles grow is ex-
panding all the time. From the time they
coded the whole truffle genome, DNA
testing has become part of the regular
testing, just as pH is. As a result, what
we might previously have considered
‘established practice’ has been
challenged.
Here are some of the key take-outs:
Healthy trees grow better truffles.
This challenges some previous thinking
that trees need to be kept stressed so
they build roots and rely on the action of
the truffles to thrive. It seems that the
truffle/tree relationship is less symbi-
otic than previously thought. Watering,
fertilising and reducing weed competi-
tion therefore become more important.
Fertiliser that promotes truffle growth
may well be different from tree growth.
A large scale trial is under way at IRTA .
Waiting, waiting...
Good soil preparation is vital.
In Spain, this includes milling to reduce
the size of stones in the soil and im-
prove texture. Good soil preparation
has been shown to bring production
forward by two to three years. We’re
blessed in Australia and New Zealand
with a range of great truffle soils, and
if you get the pH right it is clear that
you can grow in a wide range of tex-
tures. Clay soil that waterlogs being
the only exception that doesn’t work
(at least we think so this week). It was
very strange looking at the rocky soils in
Spain compared to what we have here.
Avoid compaction of soils.
Choice of machinery and the timing
of weeding and machine pruning is
important to avoid the compaction of
soil especially in the brûlés.
Truffles can actively change soil pH.
Research Marcos presented to the ATGA
conference in 2014 has been confirmed
and shows that the truffle may act on
the surrounding soil to increase the pH
to what it needs. So it may be that on-
going addition of lime is less vital than
was first thought. Defining a range of pH
that this applies to is next.
There’s a battle of the sexes.
We’ve known that two mating types are
required to produce the fruiting body.
However, it appears that over time, one
mating type can take over in each brûlé.
You still get a great looking brûlé but it
will never grow truffles. If the same mat-
ing type comes to dominate in one area
of the truffière this could explain those
non-productive zones in your paddock
that produced briefly then stopped.
Adding new spores
The successful Tereul growers now after
12 years routinely use ‘Spanish wells’
or trenches to add substrate seeded
with truffle spores to their productive
orchards. This significantly helps to en-
sure the distribution of mating types.
Typically, the ‘extra grade’ perfectly
round golf-ball size truffles are found in
the looser soil of these wells or the sides
of the trenches. The catch here is that
you need to use high grade truffle in the
substrate so you’re using the best ge-
netic material – using flavourless reject-
ed, large ugly shaped or over ripe truffle
may perpetuate undesirable character-
istics. This comes at a big expense for a
small grower. Growers Colin Carter and
Noel Fitzpatrick were doing the sums
and said in Australia it would be hard for
a small grower to justify and cheaper to
replant with new seedlings.
You can’t plant then relax.
Productivity is increased by cultivation,
ripping between the rows – this can also
help distribute the mating types. Sur-
face tilling around the trees has also
proved itself. It’s something to keep in
mind when laying out your irrigation.
Lines should be deep and not go across
the rows. And ongoing testing of mating
types will give you feedback to see if you
need to intervene. And soil bacteria?
Ideal canopy size depends on climate.
Fine tuning the canopy to the variety re-
ally works. Very hot areas may benefit
from more canopy cover, while in cold
areas the canopy needs to be restrict-
ed to allow more warmth on the ground.
Changes in latitude, the way the block
faces/slopes and micro-climate factors
all can dictate planting, standard dis-
tances apart. Rent an expert. Even plan-
ning ahead to getting a particular variety
of tree prepared, eg. Quercus coccifera
Truffières are not forever.
There may be a horizon for truffière pro-
ductivity. In Spain, highest yields tend to
be from 14 to 24 years, then production
declines, even with irrigation. Re-inocu-
lating may change this. At some point,
the truffière may become financially un-
productive and need to be abandoned.
Around Teruel, they just close the gates,
walk away and plant somewhere else –
“because there’s plenty of poor quality
land that suits truffle better than any
other agriculture”.
Processing could boost our returns.
As our supply increases, is there an op-
portunity in Australia to can more of the
highqualitysecondgradetruffleandifso,
istherealocalandexportmarketforthis?
Aestivum doesn’t suck.
You can’t judge the flavour from pro-
cessed product. Maybe we shouldn’t
even consider it ‘summer truffle’ in
Australia? It’s a very forgiving variety
and can be planted in regions that are
antagonistic to black truffle mychori-
za. You’ll need to develop a cost anal-
ysis for it given the lower sale price.
(And bianchetto doesn’t suck either, but
none of the dealers we saw were selling
it in late January.)
Indicum has to stay out.
As long as we continue to ban the impor-
tation of Chinese truffle, (unless you’re
running a trade show when it seems no-
one bothers) we’ll have one significant
advantage over our export competitors,
A goodbye dinner
The tour concluded with another epic
meal back in Barcelona. Again, Mar-
cos had selected a chef understood
the potential of truffle. The differ-
ence between this slick shoebox sized
modern restaurant and the more ro-
bust country one (at Can Jubany - Jan
writes about that here) is obvious
from the menu, which went like this:
Royal truffle with porcini ‘confited’
Quail egg, truffle, parmentier and wasabi
Faba beans with octopus and truffle
Brioche surprise (a whole small truffle
inside for each guest)
Skate with vanilla, jerusalem artichokes
puree and white truffle
Dry aged beef with yellow beet, port
sauce and black truffle
Hot cheese and truffle toasted sandwich
Red berries with lime and passionfruit.
Butterscotch, caramel caviar, Talisker
icecream and truffle.
These dinners are sometimes over-
whelming, but I reckon a good truffle
degustation every season is the best
way to learn afresh how truffle works
(and how much the chef knows about
truffle).
If you can afford the trip and the time
away from your truffière, tours such as
Marcos’ (and by Dr. Christine Fischer,
also a friend of the ATGA family who runs
a similar one which was happening in
the weeks after ours) are eye-opening.
Fortunately for the Australian contin-
gent, all the group were English-speak-
ing, and Marcos sometimes dropped
into Spanish for further explanation for
the Mexican and Chilean participants.
Hello indicum my old friend
While we were visiting Laumont they
were processing large quantities of im-
ported Tuber indicum, and had boxes
of fresh indicum ready for dispatch and
(clearly marked) tinned indicum as part
of their range. If it’s not being eaten as
a fresh culinary truffle, it clearly goes to
‘industry’ (to add black-truffle appear-
ance even if it has no flavour). A kilo of
indicum costs about A$160. This year
its sale seemed to be driven as much
by the EU stipulated seasonal calendar.
Indicum falls outside the ‘official’ dates
when wild harvested (and now farmed)
varieties can be sold as fresh.
Manel Coll from the mushroom and
truffle supplier we visited at Conservas
Coll S.L outside Barcelona, said they
were currently supplying Melansporum,
Brumale and Indicum.
The dates as prescribed by the Govern-
ment (EU) as ‘official season’ were so
that wild harvesting does not deplete
truffle forests, and that Summer Truffle
doesn’t become Winter Truffle (which it
does). It doesn’t seem to have changed
with availability of cultivated.
The dry and unseasonably warm
weather meant that the hillsides were
covered in blossom from abandoned
almond groves. The almond market
crashed in Spain some years ago
with cheaper imports from Turkey.
There was some pain in that beauty as
we flashed past.
Add truffles to this, push go and get juice.
Dr. Xavier Vilanova, partner at MF&A
runs their research in bacteria and
owns a 4000 tree truffle orchard, with
melansporum and borchii
END

7. < thinktag >© Jan O’Connell & Fred Harden 2016