Truffles in Germany

The new truffle boom in Germany began when chef Jean-Marie Dumaine found summer truffles with his dog in Sinzig an der Ahr.  

In truth, however, the artist Ingo Fritsch is the pioneer of modern truffle culture in Germany. 

Jean-Marie Dumaine

Jean-Marie Dumaine and truffle dog Max at the Truffière.

In 2002, Max, the dog of the Normandy-born chef Jean-Marie Dumaine, tracked down summer truffles on the Ahr in Rhineland-Palatinate. The chef presented the find in his restaurant in Sinzig as a sensation. He then founded the Ahr Truffle Association and in 2006 planted a truffière with truffle trees from France, which, however, only produced summer or Burgundy truffles after more than a decade. 

After that, Ludger Sproll and Ulrich Stobbe started cultivating truffle trees in Freiburg in Baden-Württemberg, and the Association for Truffle Cultivation and Use in Germany was founded. In northern Germany, the mushroom expert Dieter Honstraß founded a "German Truffle School" in Salzgitter.

Ingo Fritsch

The graphic designer, artist and nature lover Ingo Fritsch began experimenting with truffle cultivation near Kiel in northern Germany in 1994, after discovering truffles in the roots of a small tree he had brought with him from Alsace. Following his instinct, he planted truffle gardens near the Baltic Sea coast and then in the Upper Palatinate and has been harvesting Burgundy and also Périgord truffles regularly since 1997. He has replanted his trees several times.

Truffle pioneer Ingo Fritsch with freshly harvested Burgundy truffles (October 2021)

According to estimates, there were truffle crops on a total area of around 150 hectares in Germany in 2021.

Germany was never a real or "late" truffle nation. At the end of the 19th century, around 1000 kilograms were found per year. That is one tonne, less than one thousandth of the yield in France at the same time. 

A look at history

At the beginning of the 18th century, the princely courts in Germany began to take an interest in truffles, which at that time were particularly sought after in Italy. In 1712, truffle hunters with dogs were sent to Germany from Turin for the first time - who of course did not find white Piedmont truffles, but "only" summer and Burgundy truffles. 

In 1720, the first treatise on truffles in Germany was published with an illustration of summer truffles

Sources: Volbracht, C. (2012) Truffles myth and reality pp. 149-162; Volbracht, C. (2013) Tuber melanosporum, the Périgord truffle in northern Germany. Zeitschrift für Mykologie 79/2, 489-495; Volbracht C. (2020): Truffles, Fake & Facts. p. 157 ff. ; Brückmann (1720) Specimen botanicum exhibens fungos subterraneos vulgo tubera terrae dicto/ Extract of a letter from the bulbous plant, which the Italians, as I understand it from a letter sent to me, call truffle; Rittersma R. (2010): The belated truffle nation. In: Dumaine, J.-M. & Wojtko, N. Truffles, the native exotics