Guide
The black truffle, explained by the grower
Tuber melanosporum is the winter black truffle: a subterranean fungus that lives in symbiosis with oak roots and needs limestone soil, altitude and cold winters to develop its aroma.
How to recognise real black truffle
A ripe melanosporum has a black, pyramid-warted skin and a firm, marbled interior: dark flesh crossed by fine white veins. The smell is earthy, almond-like, with notes of forest floor — intense but never chemical.
Beware of Tuber indicum (Chinese truffle) and summer truffle (Tuber aestivum): visually similar, aromatically nothing alike, and a fraction of the price.
How to store it
Wrap the truffle in kitchen paper, keep it in a sealed glass jar in the fridge at 4–6 °C and change the paper every day. It keeps its best aroma for 7 to 10 days.
Never keep it in water, rice or oil. Rice absorbs the aroma you paid for.
How to use it
Always raw and shaved at the last moment, over a warm neutral fat: egg, butter, potato, pasta, rice or a simple broth. Heat destroys the volatile compounds that carry the aroma.
Rule of thumb: 5 to 8 g per person is a generous serving.