An Italian chef finds Chinese truffles to his liking

Carlos Alberto Perez makes truffle dumplings, blending the traditional Chinese dumpling with the black truffle.[Photo provided to China Daily]

"When I first smelled the unique aroma of a truffle, I felt intoxicated - as if I almost forgot every scent that I had smelled before. At that moment, I knew my life would be changed by it."

Carlos Alberto Perez is now the general manager of the Chinese branch of Sabatino, a company dedicated to truffle products.

The truffle is high in nutrition value, but it cannot be planted in large scale and can only be found and harvested in the wild, making it very expensive - "the diamond of the kitchen", as it was called by French gourmet Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin.

But only recently did the truffle become popular in Chinese kitchens.

Having lived in China for seven years, Perez cannot speak fluent Chinese, but it doesn't stop his love for Chinese food.

"I started my cooking career when I was 19. When I came to China, I found the food culture is rich," Perez says.

"There are so many dishes I hadn't tasted before, and I like them very much."

Perez is determined to bring the truffle to more Chinese. "Those Chinese dishes give me inspirations to create dishes with truffles that appeal to Chinese stomach."

Perez went to search for truffles in Yunnan in 2009.

"I heard that there were truffles in Yunnan, but villagers didn't know how to eat them - some even feed pigs with truffles."

Perez still remembers with laughter the time he went to the local market with a bag of cash, describing the black truffle to the people through gestures.

He once took a 20-hour ride in a minivan to a Gaoligong mountain village seeking black truffles. The villagers scrambled to show this foreigner the truffles they picked in the mountains for a good price.

Now, Perez has business partners in every major truffle-producing area of Yunnan, purchasing 30 tons of truffles to sell to buyers at home and abroad every year.