“The passion is there, the motivation too”: in Comprégnac, the truffle season is launched

Les truffes sont commercialisées sous la marque déposée par l’Association des Trufficulteurs de l’Aveyron. Roger Lafon

Before the Truffle Festival which will take place on Sunday 22nd December in the small village of South Aveyron, the first harvesters have come to present the fruit of a year of work.

In Comprégnac, an unusual excitement reigns in the corridors of the Maison de la Truffe… Having come to present the fruit of a year of work, the producers – there are 160 members of the association – are launching the truffle harvest season which runs from December to February. A season which according to the first suppliers suggests a great vintage, both in terms of quality and quantity.

By going through the quality control, we comment, we give our impressions, we check the variety, the quality, the appearance. And as in previous years, the result is there, implacable: 50% of the truffles harvested in the last week do not meet the quality criteria. A classic that does not alter in any way the enthusiasm of the joyful assembly a few days before the Truffle Festival which will take place on Sunday, December 22.

A moment of sharing, this first meeting is also an opportunity to meet the president of the association, Mathieu Rivière, and some of the members of the association, proud to perpetuate a little of the truffle history of the Occitanie region which is none other than the most important in France. “The passion is there, the motivation too”, confirms the treasurer whose ambition remains the same: to make known and develop the economy of this mushroom, particularly among the younger generations who arrive in the association on tiptoe.

As for the selected truffles, they will be shipped to brokers, restaurateurs and customers, under the trademark registered by the Association of Truffle Growers of Aveyron of which it is the sole custodian: Black Truffle of Aveyron. The result of a year of work in the plantations, care given to the trees and work on the soil.