Màrius Carol

1999

Mushrooms are the buttons on the moss shirt that the forest puts on as soon as it begins to get cold. When we pick them, the mountain opens its blouse to let in the last rays of sun, before putting on its bright white winter coat. There are, however, some other mushrooms that the mountain keeps stored under its skin as if they were jewels of the most prized kind.

Thusly, truffles become the dark emeralds that the earth hoards away greedily from its autumn suitors. If other mushrooms are a metaphor for life, born enveloped in water, to grow under the heat of the white-hot star, the truffle is Nature’s fable of greed. Nature, so generous and unselfish in other ways, seems to have reserved these gems for its own pleasure. Man’s love affair, however, transcends that of nature and he has trained his dogs to use their refined sense of smell and break into the forest’s safe, like the night owl, to extract its precious stones in the form of truffles.

The Roig Robí restaurant transforms milk mushrooms, porcini mushrooms, chanterelles, St George’s mushrooms or morels into a renaissance of “dead nature”, to excite our senses at the white clothes on its tables when the autumn arrives. In the same way, the dark truffles change the score of any dish, for it must not be forgotten that they are the best tenors in this baroque-style opera of winter cuisine, making our senses applaud as soon as the culinary overture begins. With truffles, every dish becomes an aria.”