Jubilant Cristiano Savini holding his Palaia truffle (picture by AP)
Cristiano Savini, an Italian truffle hunter and trader, and his father Luciano under help of their dog Rocco last week found an usually giant truffle in Palaia, a town about 40 kilometers from Pisa. At the annual International Tuscan Truffle Auction held simultaneously in Macau, London and Florence on December 1, Macau casino mogul Stanley Ho made the winning bid for the 3.3 pound (1.5 kg) at a record price US$330,000, outbidding British artist Damien Hirst and Sheikh Mansour Bin Zayed of Abu Dhabi.
The Palaia truffle's price bested the previous record for a truffle of $212,000, and might soon rewrite a Guinness World Records which currently lists a 2.86 pound white truffle found in Croatia in 1999 as the biggest.
Truffle [wiki], dubbed as "the diamond of the kitchen" is highly valued fungus which has a smell similar to deep-fried sunflower seeds or walnuts and is believed having aphrodisiacal powers. Source: AP Tags: