My mil brought home a small jar of truffle butter from Hong Kong recently. I have never eaten truffle butter or heard of the name before. Yes, I have heard of truffles as in chocolate or cake but not truffle butter. I’ll bet you have not heard of truffle butter too. It is very expensive and is considered a gourmet delicacy.

Truffles are wild mushrooms. They are round, warty, irregular in shape and vary from the size of a walnut to that of a man’s fist. The season for most truffles falls between September and May. Since the times of the Greeks and Romans these fungi have been used in Europe as delicacies, as aphrodisiacs, and as medicines. They are among the most expensive of the world’s natural foods, often commanding as much as $250 to $450 per pound!!

Truffles are very expensive as they are very difficult to harvest. Truffles are harvested in Europe with the aid of female pigs or truffle dogs, which are able to detect the strong smell of mature truffles underneath the surface of the ground. The female pig becomes excited when she sniffs a chemical that is similar to the male swine sex attractant. The use of pigs is risky, though, because of their natural tendency to eat any remotely edible thing. For this reason, dogs have been trained to dig into the ground wherever they find these odors, and they willingly exchange their truffle for a piece of bread and a pat on the head. Not a bad trade for the truffle hunter! Some truffle merchants dig for their prizes themselves when they see truffle flies hovering around the base of a tree. Once discovered, truffles can be collected in subsequent years at the same site.

My breakfast – a slice of wholemeal walnut bread.  Half a slice with kaya and half a slice with truffle butter.