Truffles

On Friday we had the chance to go truffle hunting with Massimo (left) and his two truffle dogs.

This entails walking through the woods behind Massimo and the dogs while they sniff and root around. Truffle dogs apparently take about two years to train, and it was fun to watch them nosing around.

The only problem was, this is the beginning of white truffle season and there just weren't many truffles to be found. Plus this was the first time Massimo led a group of peole around with him and the dogs and I think the dogs found us very distracting. Especially once they realized there wasn't much happening in the way of truffle-finding and decided it might be a better idea to just kind of run around, roll around in the scent of dead things and chew on an old deer skull.

At some point Massimo decided to give the dogs a little morale boost, and he asked Steve and the 11-year-old in the group to bury a previously found truffle that he had in his pocket, so that the dogs could have the satisfaction of actually finding something.

As I mentioned, there were two dogs with us. One of these was an old female dog, called Nice (as in Have a nice day), and the other, a young male dog, called J. Well J was definitely the faster of the two, and he kept finding all the truffles that Massimo had us bury. J was then beyond happy, and would run to Massimo for his affection and treat.

Nice had already started to get a little depressed that she wasn't finding anything, but when the young upstart started getting all the truffles and attention, that proved just too much for her to bear. Tail deep between her legs, she dramatically walked into the brush a little ways away from us and lay down. She wouldn't move, she wouldn't acknowledge petting, she wouldn't take a treat. She just lay there, with baleful eyes and sulked.

It was so hard not to laugh at how sweet it was. So dramatic, so calculated, so clearly done for our benefit. After a while, Massimo rolled her over, rubbed her belly at which time she seemed to decide she had milked it enough and she got up and trotted along with us again, tail wagging. A lady knows to never overplay her hand.