Truffles are fun-guys

Chef Fillipini and Winemaker Michael

One of the things I really like about being a blogger is I’m considered a “member of the media”. It is an awesome designation in the sense that I get invited to things like previews and awesome events. One such preview happened yesterday, November 9, 2013 at Le Vigne winery. Owner and Chef, Walter Fillipini got in some rare white truffles from Italy, which he is using for an upcoming winemaker dinner on November 23, 2013.

White Truffle in the bowl on the left

October is the beginning of the very short white truffle season in Italy. Historically truffle hunters used special pigs to help find and dig up these little gems, but now a days they also use dogs to sniff them out because the pigs like to eat them too much. White truffles are highly aromatic, extremely expensive, quite rare, knuckle shaped mushrooms, that have been called “the diamonds in the kitchen”. In 2007 a world record price of $330,000 was paid at auction for a white truffle weighing 3.3 lb. On Saturday, Chef had an 8oz white truffle worth $2000 on display.