Grab the dogs!” Melissa shouts and starts sprinting. She navigates between rows of thin beeches, their rusty leaves shimmering in the low October sun, and is the first one to reach the spot where two very excited Cocker Spaniels are sniffing the ground. They’re ready to dig but, this time, Melissa is faster. She gently shifts the dogs away and starts breaking the damp ground. Soon, she’s presenting a handful of round, plum-sized balls, coal-black and warty. Their scent is lightly floral, sweet and nutty, with earthy undertones of raw beetroot. Truffles. Not in the hills of Piedmont, not in the Périgord region of southwest France. Melissa Waddingham has been hunting for these delicacies in the grounds of Sussex for the last 15 years.
The world’s most celebrated fungi, white truffles — tuber magnatum — often associated with the Italian town of Alba, are found in the limestone-rich soils all the
