It was another night making a meal from a box. Now don’t get the wrong idea, it wasn’t a box of mac-n-cheese, though that’s not a put down, I love mac-n-cheese. But this was a special box, a box of organic, vegetarian food from Green Chef… and it would alter the trajectory of our lives.

The dinner in question was, in fact, a truffle risotto. (Knowing what I know today, I should have probably put the word truffle in quotes, but that’s for another time.) Like nearly every meal we had from Green Chef, it was wonderful. But this meal, this singular dinner, sent me down a rabbit hole (again, maybe I should have said “gopher” hole) of internet searches looking for that amazing ingredient: black truffles.

At the time I had no idea what I was looking for: black truffle, winter truffle, Perigord truffle… it was all foreign to me. But because we love local food, and because we wanted to find local truffles I ended up, naturally, in Oregon.

A few short searches and I found what I was looking for: Perigord truffles from an Oregon supplier. Soon I’d be emailing with Alana McGee of Truffle Dog Company and asking how I could get truffles sent to my door. But it gets better.

Soon Alana was asking, “I don’t know how close you are to Templeton, but if you’re interested we’re doing a hunt and demonstration at a truffle orchard there and I can bring your truffles personally.” Now, I don’t necessarily believe in Fate… ok, I do, and this was definitely it. “We’re two hours away,” I said, “How do we sign up?”

In a few short days we went from eating truffle risotto to hunting truffles at Caelesta Vineyard in Templeton, CA with Alana McGee of Truffle Dog Company. We would spend a wonderful day with Alana and Lolo (the queen of all truffle dogs), hunting truffles at Caelesta. And if that wasn’t enough, we all moved over to the Caelesta tasting room for wine tasting and truffle-topped Neapolitan pizza.

As we finished this delightful day, heading home with full bellies and fresh truffles to boot, I had a moment of reflection. We just spent a morning outside, walking through nature with dogs, meeting amazing people, hunting for amazing food and later drinking amazing wine… I suddenly had a retirement plan.

And here we are… nearly three years later we have three trained truffle dogs, thanks to Alana and Victoria at Truffle Dog Co. We have wonderful friends like Brian at Caelesta, and are hunting orchards from Big Bear to Ukiah. Thank you Green Chef…