Thoroughly Truffled. Thursday 10th September, 2009.

Gilles greeted us at his truffle farm at 3pm along with his three golden haired Labradors. Aria is his working truffle dog and the baby, who was born in June, is in training, the older and more docile lab is in retirement now. Oh, please let me come back as a truffle dog. Gilles throws them pieces of truffle to eat every day, ‘They love truffe’, he says.

Gilles grabbed his bag to go on a truffle hunt with us, immediately Aria begins to tear at it and jump up excitedly. The pup is more interested in pulling at JR’s shoe laces and anything else he can find.

Gilles is a 4th generation trufficulteur; his great Grandfather planted the first trees on this farm many years ago. His truffles are exported to Australia too, many of which are used to turn ordinary trees into Australia’s truffle producing trees of the future.

Under the shady oak trees we wander and while Gilles stops to talk about his life, Aria begins to dig excitedly in the sandy earth. She unearths a small truffle, a wild truffle which has incredible intensity for its size. Aria unearths another wild truffle a little further on which she is given to eat as a reward, the lucky dog.

Back at the house we are given a wonderful truffle degustation. Gilles shaves three whole summer truffles onto a plate and drizzles the slivers with a local olive oil. He uses a toothpick to place the shaved slices onto small rounds of fresh white baguette and tops them with a tiny sprinkling of the olive oil, it is a divine combination and we eat well. Gilles splashes a tiny drop of oil infused with the powerfully aromatic black winter truffle for us to compare – it is the star. It is full of intensity, there is nothing subtle about it, it is filled with the earthy pungency that only a winter truffle owns.

Gilles has been a wonderful host and gives me a book of his mother’s hand written truffle recipes; what a treasure. AJ and JR end the visit sitting by the Porsche Cayenne in the driveway, no doubt talking car stats. Gilles passion is Porsches, it turns out he has three. He is happy to back the shinning 911 out of his timber-doored garage for a photo. It was AJ’s lucky day, Gilles took him for a ride; I have never seen a boy beam with happiness as AJ did.