Education & Flavour
About Truffles
What are truffles, how do they grow, and how do you cook with them?
The Most Sought-After Ingredient on Earth
Pick up a ripe truffle and you will understand immediately. The aroma is intense — earthy, musky, with hints of hazelnut and something almost sweet underneath. It fills a room. It changes the way you think about food. For thousands of years, people have been captivated by this strange underground fungus, and once you have tasted a fresh one, you will understand why.
Truffles grow underground in a partnership with host trees — English oak, Holm oak, and hazelnut. The fungus wraps around the tree's roots in a symbiotic relationship, exchanging nutrients. They fruit in winter, hidden beneath the soil, and ripen slowly in the cold. You cannot see them. You find them by smell, using trained dogs who can detect the aroma through the earth.
A Very Old Obsession
The ancient Greeks believed truffles were created by lightning striking the earth. Aristotle wrote about them. Pythagoras considered them an aphrodisiac. By the time of ancient Rome, truffles were a documented luxury — recipes survive from the 4th century AD.
The Middle Ages were less kind. The church was suspicious of their mysterious origins and their association with the dark, cold months of winter. But the Renaissance brought truffles back to the table, and they never left again. Napoleon was devoted to them. Alexandre Dumas called them "the holy of holies." The composer Rossini was so obsessed he wept only three times in his life — once when a truffled turkey fell into a river.
Truffles in Australia
Australia began cultivating black truffles in the 1990s, and the first significant harvests came in the early 2000s. It was a bold experiment — taking a European fungus and coaxing it to fruit in Australian soil. It worked. Today, Australian black truffles are recognised worldwide for their quality, and our growing season (June to August) means we supply the Northern Hemisphere in their off-season.
Blue Frog Truffles has been part of this story since 2003, when Wayne Haslam planted the first oaks and hazelnuts on our farm north of Canberra. The first harvest came in 2007, and we have been growing every year since.
How to Enjoy Truffles
How much do I need?
A little goes a long way. As a guide:
- 3 grams per person for an appetiser or garnish
- 5 grams per person for a main course
A 50-gram truffle is roughly the size of a large hen's egg.
What do they taste like?
The flavour is deep and savoury — umami-rich, earthy, with notes of mushroom, hazelnut, and garlic. Every truffle is slightly different depending on the soil and the season, but the best ones have a complexity that stays with you long after the meal.
What do they go with?
Truffles love simple, rich foods: eggs, butter, cream, pasta, risotto, potatoes, chicken, and mushrooms. The key is to let the truffle be the star. Shave it as thinly as possible — the more surface area exposed, the more aroma released.
Storage
Store truffles in the fridge, wrapped in paper towel inside a sealed jar. Change the paper daily and they will keep well for up to three weeks.
You can also store truffles alongside eggs, chocolate, or macadamia nuts — the aroma infuses through shells and packaging, adding truffle flavour to those ingredients without even shaving the truffle. Truffles can also be preserved in alcohol for longer storage.
Ready to Try Some?
Fresh Black Périgord truffles from Blue Frog Truffles are available during the winter season — harvested on Wednesdays and Sundays, and express-posted across Australia within 48 hours, or available for purchase on Wednesday by prior arrangement, or at our Sunday truffle hunts near Canberra.