Smells like dirt. Costs like crazy. It’s truffle time

        Only once before have I seen these rare ovoli mushrooms with their wonderfully flamboyant orange skin in New York. Indeed, they are a rarity even in Italy. Tony May seems a bit in shock and awe himself as he comes toward our table at SD26 with a pile of odd nubby objects in various states of undress on a platter.

       “My truffle men sent these along with the truffle shipment. They are ovoli,” he said.  “You have to taste.”  Meanwhile, the four of us are weighing our options on the new truffle menu, a listing of 14 dishes the house feels best show off white truffle. Everything from minced fillet of raw beef to mushroom toast with cheese fondue ($17.50 each) to the house’s signature soft egg yolk-filled raviolo with truffled butter ($22.50) or a classic house-made fettucine with butter and parmigiano. Surprisingly, there is even dessert, a whole milk granita for $9, offered as a vehicle for truffles.  Embellishment with the hard-to-find tuber costs $8.00 per gram, it says at the top of each page. I’m no good at math – is it a deal?  I only know May says he’s paying $3500 to $4000  a kilo from his overseas source after airfare. And the mid-Novermber peak is yet to come.

       My friend Marcia decides that she’ll have her truffles on ravioli del plin – small pasta packages filled with veal and tossed with veal jus. At just that moment, a waiter arrives with four plates - “a gift from Mr. May” –a lovely mess of thinnest slices of raw ovoli in a delicate olive oil ($17.50 were you to insist on paying).  The flavor, notoriously delicate, is so subtle I can’t quite pinpoint it.  Maybe just a scent of outdoors.  It’s more about the texture.

       Cautiously, Marcia asks for one gram of truffle on her pasta. The waiter shares three tiny flutters, so thin and small I can barely find them.

       “For goodness sake. Give her two grams,” I cry.

       Embarrassed – or maybe in a charitable gesture – the man drops several more flutters.  I help myself to a small lump suitably accessorized.  Yes, you can smell it. But by the time we pass the dish around the table, there’s none for Marcia’s husband.
 
       “You need at least 5 or 6 grams,” Marisa May tells me later.  Too late for us alas. But take it from me now. There’s no point in penny pinching truffles.  Just let them grate away till you can smell moist forest.  Put it on your credit card and have scrambled eggs for dinner next day.

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