Secret Garden

The rich bounties of Southeast Asia will certainly surprise any seasoned gourmand. And we aren’t even talking about kopi luak.

- Koh Yuen Lin

Priced at around $6,000 per kilogram, the Alba White Truffle is one of the most expensive produce money can buy. Just last year, a Hong Kong bidder broke records at the Italian Alba White Truffle World charity auction by forking out €120,000 (S$188,342) for a 1.005kg specimen. Many other truffle aficionados make annual pilgrimages to Italy, attending hunts and fairs, and shelling out thousands to get their hands on it on a fresh batch. But guess what: white truffle grows naturally in Chiang Mai.

In 2017, researchers from Chiang Mai University unearthed a knobbly lump in a national park surrounding Mount Suthep in northwestern Thailand and discovered that it was the tuber magnatum—the very same species of fungi as Italy’s much sought-after white truffle. While the white truffle has yet to be commercially grown or harvested in Thailand, the discovery goes to show that—while often perceived as a tropical region with little premium produce to offer—Southeast Asia is full of agricultural (and aquacultural) surprises.

Matsutake mushroom in Laos

The urban legend goes like this: a Japanese soldier stayed on in Laos after the end of World War II, returning home only decades later. His friends were all shocked: though they were all advancing in years, he was as sprightly as a young man. His secret, apparently, was a diet that comprised of generous quantities of an abundant local mushroom—called het wai in the local language, and known as matsutake everywhere else in the world.