Dear Reader, what are your favourite things about Winter? Is it the warming food, coats or boots? Yes to all of those for me but also add winter’s short lived black diamonds aka truffles to the list. I’m standing at Vue de Monde in Melbourne, about to partake in a masterclass held with Audi ambassador Shannon Bennett. Selected Audi buyers have access to these events throughout the year through Audi’s collaboration with their ambassadors which also includes Kylie Kwong, Matt Moran and Collette Dinnigan. Our fleet of cars starts off by taking us to a truffle farm where we will start our day. There’s a breakfast box in the car waiting for us as well as very useful seat warmers (it’s cold!).
Hastily purchased gum boots
The egg and bacon roll, bircher muesli and poached pears with a crumble topping are quickly devoured on the way to our first stop. The Chestnut Hill farm owned by Croatian born couple Charlie and Ithaca has what has been said to be one of the most prolific truffle growing farms in Australia. Planting the hazelnut and oak trees with the truffle spores in 2003 as a sideline hobby for their wine business, they found their 210 trees on 1.5 acres produced a surprising amount of truffles.
Australia’s success farming truffles is borne of a few things. Firstly the weather in areas such as this, Manjimup and Tasmania is ideal which are hot summers and cold winters. Manjimup in W.A. where former test cricketer Wally Edwards first conceived the idea over 20 years ago, is said to have a weather that mirrors the Pyrenees. Truffles are best kept in a place like a cigar box for a maximum of 7 days.
Chef Shannon Bennett
Australia’s untouched farmland is also said to be in our favour. Countries like the United States where there is a lot of agriculture, has struggled to farm truffles because of the existing or previous agricultural activity. Truffles seem to like the idea of appearing on cleared land where there has been no activity for the previous 30 years.
The brulee around the tree where grass doesn’t grow but may hold truffles
If there are native trees like gum trees with their own bacteria, these will flourish in favour of the introduced truffle spores. Truffles also need a soil ph level of 8. And we’re just talking about the black truffles here, white truffles have never been able to have been successfully farmed and only appear in riverbank areas of Italy and Croatia. Australia’s truffle industry produces about 2,000 kilos of truffles a year during this short season.
At the farm we meet Spice, the truffle dog. Trained to detect ripe truffles, Spice is a sought after truffle dog. Indeed, we first encountered Spice and her owner trainer Sue last year at Chateau Yering in the Yarra Valley. Spice has since had a prized litter and Shannon is the proud owner of one of the litter who he is training to be a truffle dog. To train a truffle dog, you introduce the distinctive smell of truffle to the dog and associate it with play and treats. They have an advantage over pigs who were traditionally and first used to hunt truffles as the pigs love to eat the truffles whereas dogs can be trained to hand it over once found.
Wearing gum boots (a last minute not very stylish purchase late last night!), Christie and I set out with Spice, Ziva a truffle dog in training and Spice’s offspring Trixie to hunt for truffles. She darts off and before long, she has located a truffle. Each tree has a brulee (meaning burnt) area which is a ring around it where grass no longer grows and this is where the truffles can be found.
Shannon lays a cushion down and bends down to sniff the ground. The scent is good. A dog may lead you to a truffle but you still have to sniff the ground to see whether it is ripe enough or not. Spice is about one season away from being able to detect perfectly ripe truffles. The season is short lasting just a couple of months but she is also trained off season to be able to detect them.
A rotting truffle
Getting down on their knees, they dig at it with a wooden spoon (for the uninitiated they won’t be able to cut into a precious truffle). Paring back dirt, much like excavating a fossil from the ground, they remove enough dirt to be able to gently lift it out of the ground. This one is enormous, almost 250grams and worth about $280. It has a strong aroma and we take this back to be gently cleaned to reveal the beautiful black cross hatch pattern. At Vue de Monde, these are further cleaned with electrolysed water.
Some delicious hazelnut and pistachio cupcakes, wine and some cheese later after warming up next to the outdoor fire, we make our way to Burnham Beeches, Shannon’s latest production. A large area of land there are plans to make self contained accommodation, three restaurants, a bakery and plans have just been approved to start a Sunday farmer’s market in the area.
For now, there is the start of a trufferie which they are hoping to grow and develop over the next few years. Some of the herbs and produce are grown for Vue de Monde restaurants and Shannon goes off to pick some sheep’s sorrel which has an unusual, tart flavour, much like slightly unripe green grape skins.
Sheep’s sorrel
He also shows us a building where Princess Diana and prince Charles stayed on their honeymoon which is being refurbished and will also turn into accommodation.
It’s a forty minute drive back to Vue de monde at the Rialto for our truffle lunch. With their own check in at the bottom of the building, we are escorted to the elevator where they guide us up to the 55th floor.
Only bar or restaurant patrons can get there as there is no 55th floor button and after some ear popping speed we arrive at the top. The view is magnificent and reminds me immediately of those sky high Hong Kong bars where it’s all expansive city view. The MCG sits on one side and Philip Island in another direction. The bar is a mix of luxe baroque furniture with gold chaise lounges, large hard plastic clouds sit atop a shiny bar.
We make our way to the room where we are dining and a large communal table. The settings are in black baroque with what looks to be cutlery sprayed black. The menu sits on the table and there is a three course lunch for us with the entree and main with truffles although the dessert without.
Our first course is brought to us and Shannon introduces it as course that is meant to be eaten with the hands. It’s a marron that you dip in truffle cream. To the side is a wafer thin sandwich filled with cold marron meat accented with lemon and there is also some marron salt from crushing the shell with salt although the marron really doesn’t need any extra seasoning.
Pemberton marron, truffle and brown butter emulsion served with 2010 Over the Shoulder Chardonnay, Yarra Valley, Victoria
The marron itself is so beautifully tender poached for just one minute and then finished with thyme butter to give it a soft, luscious texture. We use the bread to mop up every single drop of the truffle cream it’s so heady and delicious. And you can bet that if I had this truffle cream at home and no bread, there would be no other choice than gathering every last drop with fingers or tongue.
Beef cheek, beetroot, smoked bone marrow served with 2008 Castagna “genesis” syrah, Beechworth, Victoria
The beef cheek, cooked until silky soft with truffles, also had tiny truffle shavings on top and around the plate. It was served with two squat squirts of pommes mousseline, thinly sliced beetroot, baked beetroot segments and onion rings which had a good sharp contrast to the the richness of the beef and sweetness of the beetroot. The sheep’s sorrel which we picked earlier sits on top. There was said to be smoked bone marrow there but I didn’t see any in mine.
Apple ‘tarte fine’, caramel sauce, creme anglause served with 2008 Stick Botrytis Semillon, Yarra Valley, Victoria. Shot with a Sigma 17-50mm F2.8 EX DC OS lens, ISO 640, focal length 30mm, 1/400 shutter.
The dessert, an apple tarte fine created quite a few oohs and aahs when it was brought to the table, not least because of the size as it could have happily fed two but even happier, it fed one as we were all give our own tarts! There was a thin buttery pastry and thin sugared apples slices which caramelised in the oven. On top was a rapidly melting very vanilla bean ice cream which soon became a creamy sauce for the crispy pastry and soft apple.
Even the coffee and tea is served in a unique fashion. These “cans” are containers that house various types of tea: English breakfast, Earl Grey, Peppermint and Chamomile and along with this are six types of sugar from raw, crystal stick to rapadura.
Petit fours
Like Monty Python, it’s the final wafer before we burst, but we can’t help ourselves and we help ourselves to the light as air chocolate mousse with liquid raspberry filling. I think I might have struggled to have gotten on the flight had they weighed me! And eating, of course is my other favourite part of winter 
So tell me Dear Reader, what excites you about winter? And have you ever cooked with truffles?
NQN and Christie attended the Audi Vue de Monde Masterclass as a guest of Audi
Audi Masterclasses are available for selected customers of Audi dealerships. Other Audi ambassadors are Kylie Kwong, Matt Moran and Collette Dinnigan.
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50 Comments | Add your own
Vue de monde looks beautiful (I want those cans for myself). What a fascinating day. The closest I have ever come to truffle is truffle oil and judging by the fact that I wasn’t knocked flat by the impact of the aroma/flavour I don’t think it was anything like real truffle might be. Hope I get to try it one day
What a fabulous experience! Those dogs are too cute
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WOW That was a massive truffle!
My favourite thing about winter is porridge, soups and coats/jeans
There is no need for coats and boots in Brisbane in winter. People wear them of course, but there is no need.
What a fantastic day! We were recently invited to an Audi Collette Dinighan evening but to be honest this would have been so much more fun for us foodies. And yes, boots, scarves and giant jackets and frozen fingers included! Love winter.
Hi Lorraine, that looks like a wonderful and very interesting day. I didn’t know the truffle season was so short. What a business farming them! Those dogs are priceless! I love the look of that meal you enjoyed. I love beef cheeks and that dessert is gorgeous xx
Wow those are big truffles! But I keep getting distracted by the chef’s hair, I hope that he wears something on his head in the kitchen… and actually, he should when coming out to the dining room as well. Or maybe I am too European?
What a fabulous Masterclass, the food looked delicious and the daytime event sounded extremely interesting
So jealous! Your day looked amazing. Thanks for sharing xox
Thanks for sharing your foodie experiences Lorraine. You certainly get to see some wonderful places, people and animals! Just love those dogs.
Keep up the good work…..
What a fantastic excursion and meal. I’m envious!
As for boots and winter.. I look forward to spring. It will be 27 next Friday! Yay!
You are so lucky to have access to such gorgeous truffles. And the food looks exceptionally fine. One of the dogs looks just like my Roscoe, who certainly couldn’t sniff out more than a mouse!
I love all the seasons and welcome the change. I don’t do well with long, hard, bleak winters (I don’t have such here in Mexico), but I love some gray days, boots, winter clothes and comforting food. I just love the coziness of it all. And fireplaces…and Irish Coffees.
Thank you again for such an informative post! Until I struck a whole lot of Oz foodies, restaurateurs and producers on Facebook a couple of years ago I never had an idea how important the truffle industry had become in this country. As you know, Lorraine, I live out ‘Picton Way’ in NSW and there are a number of big procducers twixt Mittagong and Goulburn [about 120 km ++ from Sydney for o'seas readers]. Fascinating industry and what a product!! I LOVE, love, love truffles: the white Italian ones best, I guess, but the Oz products are beautiful: unfortunately my pocketbook does not like the $ signs displayed at all
! What is best in winter: that spring is not far behind!!! Am definitely not a winter nor summer person – love spring and autumn 
!
Oh it’s very interesting to read about how the truffles are found etc. It’s hard to purchase fresh truffles in KL, usually we jus have to get our fix from the restaurants.
I adore Mr Bennett! Such an interesting, driven person. Sounds like some great new projects he has coming up.
We have loads of wild sorrel growing as weeds round our place. When we ate at Vue de Monde I told him that. Now whenever I pull out our excess sorrel I hear Mr Bennett’s voice saying “Oh no, to us they’re not weeds! They’re very precious!” I let a couple of plants grow now
I can’t believe you dug up a truffle yourself. That is amazingly cool. It was so huge… how did it taste I wonder.
BTW, they have white truffles in the US in Oregon now!
Thanks for the wonderful photos accompanying your story. Both make me feel as though I’ve experienced this wonderful day in person. Shannon looks as enticing as the beautiful food he produces!
Lorraine, you get to do the BEST things. You call it a job, no? Please do let me know when you retire
Such a fun day! Thanks for letting me tag along. Wouldn’t mind a whole plate of those marron right now, they were so moist and delicious!
What a great day! Those dogs are super cute and all that food looks amazing. Favourite thing about Winter…it’s the best excuse to curl up on the couch with a blanket and a good movie!
Truffle hunting your weekend away my friend, what an experience
So cool!
Loving the gumboots by the way!
Cheers
Choc Chip Uru
That looks like a fund day out! So lucky!
wow, looks very fancy!
I love snuggling up by the heater with a good book in winter! I also look forward to hot soups for comfort
my goodness what a great day, if we had colder winters here in Auckland I would be planting truffle. I’m off to Melbourne in a few weeks, already lining the restaurants up.
popcorn with truffle oil.
*swoons*
I think I’d be too scared to cook with something so expensive!
I think stews and uggboots would be my favourite things about winter and log fireplaces.
Those boots look fabulous – and I love the idea of hunting for your own truffles in the woods!
I love the unique idea of the cans! and the glass bottle of milk next to it — looks so cute!
Love the gum boots! Looks like you certainly had a great day. Truffles are so exciting and it would be amazing to dig up a beauty like that one
I love Vue de Monde! I went their in February for post dinner cocktails, and I can’t wait to go back. There is no better view of Melbourne
What an incredible trip, and how lucky that you were able to actually hunt for truffles! I adore them but sadly JT is not a fan. I have a pair of rubber boots that I purchased in Bath (UK) that are red with white polkadots! I adore them!
mm black diamond indeed! I love cooking with truffles and when they’re not in season I like to use truffle oil
Looks like it was an amazing day and his new venture sounds exciting!
i wish to go truffle hunting some day too.
Oh Lorraine! This all looks so fun and delicious and those dogs are so pretty that I almost wish I was back in Australia… but not, because if I was, I’d be in my dull life, not your exciting one
xo
I adore truffles, there isn’t anything like that aroma that fills your nostrils and then your mouth. I have a friend who trains truffle dogs here – how I’d love to have one! GG
Melbourne and Truffles, nothing gets better than this. What a great trip and it truly does make winter more enjoyable.
Great post Lorraine! That truffle is enormous and the truffle dogs, adorable! Melbourne is such a perfect winter destination ; )
gah!! where did you get those boots lorraine?? i need gumboots for this weekend!!
WOW that’s epic Lorraine! So much truffle and I never knew we had truffles in Melbourne hehe! I’ve never cooked with them and are new to eating them but hehe think i’ve fallen in love!
The most weird tasting truffle i had was a truffle macaron in HK!
Hi Leanne! We bought them at Big W
That was the only place that was open at the time and they were the only ones that they had! 
i love it how there is as much comments if not more about your boots than the food. i love truffle, my dad is from the Dordogne region in France, so every winter we did our truffled pates and Foie gras with Truffles. I m going back this winter with my pen and book and get all their recipes, I am kicking myself at not watching them more carefully and learning when i lived there. but then when you’re 16, you don’t want to force feed the geese and make pates you want to sleep in and listen to music.
Such an interesting post Lorraine, that food is to die for, Shannon is a genius and I love his new venture but have to agree with Alessandra, I can’t stand that hair of his. I feel like whipping out an elastic and tying it back, Argh!
I’ve yet to try the Australian Truffles but have had oodles of the Italian ones so can’t complain.
What do I like about Winter….the fact that I can be in the kitchen all day cooking and baking, it’s a great way to keep warm.
—Oooo, Truffles!
The Adventures!
The Delectable Life of (( YOU!))
The Rubber Boots!
The Petit fours!
WOWwwww. Xxxx KISSsss
fabulous, thanks!! love a big w bargain xx
oh, and your thoughts on TB this season?? I’m not as caught up in it compared to the last couple, it’s missing something…
As truffle farmers its our favourite thing about winter too! Lorraine you gave your readers a perfect insight into our world… well done!
Hi Leanne! Yes TB doesn’t seem to have grabbed me this season as it has in previous seasons. I can’t quite put my finger on why though? :S
hmm, maybe not enough eric without his shirt on…
I love this post!! & I totally need gumboots in my life. They’re so cute!
Heidi xo
I never knw truffle season is so short. Explains their scarcity! To think a fruit has never been farmed outside it’s natural zone….white truffles are no wonder so rare. Another lovely, entertaining and informative post. And GORGEOUS pictures!
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