Elite life |
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Mushrooms |
Tuber |
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A truffle is the valuable and highly sought-after, edible
fruiting body of a group subterranean ascomycete fungi of the genus
Tuber. All truffles are ectomycorrhizal and are therefore found in close
association with trees. Strictly speaking, these are the only "true"
truffles. However, the term has been applied to several other genera of
underground fungi around the world. The ascoma (fruiting body) of
truffles is highly prized as a food, their smell has been described as
similar to deep-fried sunflower seeds or walnuts, although it has also
been described as "a foul aroma. |
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║ Mushrooms ║ |
Black Summer Truffle (Tuber aestivum) |
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Habitat buried usually near beech on calcareous soil. Season late summer
to autumn. Edible good. Found in Europe. |
Description:
Fruit body 3-14 cm across, globose, covered in pyramidal warts, blackish
brown. Flesh whitish becoming marbled grey-brown. Taste nutty, smell
sweet. Spores ovoid, reticulate, 20-40 x 15-30 μm. |
White Truffle, Alba Truffle (Tuber magnatum) |
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It is found in North Italy buried in deciduous woods. Edible excellent.
Found in Europe (grows almost exclusively in Italy and
northern Croatia, is known as the grand duke of truffles).
More rare and expensive than the French black winter or Périgord
truffles. The best white truffles, it is generally agreed, come from the
Piedmont region of Italy,
particularly around the town of Alba. They appear only from mid-October
to the end of December. They are hard to find (most truffle hunters use
trained dogs to sniff them out from where they lie buried next to tree
roots) and cannot be cultivated. |
Description:
Fruit
body white or creamish coloured, 3-16 cm across sperical or potato
shaped. Very strongly scented. It is distinguished by the one- to four-spored
asci 60-120 x 40-100 um and elliptic, reticulate spores 35-50 x 32-42 μm. |
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║ Mushrooms ║ |
