Story by Ellie Heffernan
Photos by Kathryn Osygus
Hillsborough, N.C.– In the early 90s, two veterinarians, a secretary and an R&D systems manager – all women working at an RTP company that researched birds – put an ad in a paper now called INDY Week.
That’s not a set-up for a joke. It’s how Betty Garland, the R&D manager, met Franklin Garland.
Betty and her friends wrote that they were seeking four men to go out with on St. Patrick’s day. Franklin responded, but he didn’t make the first cut.
“I was one of the benchwarmers,” he said.
But he was later invited to one of the veterinarian’s birthday parties, where he met Betty. They’ve been married for 27 years.
And they’ve started an empire, managing a 10-acre orchard that, during full production, earns up to $500,000 annually.
The source of this sum? Roughly 50 pounds of truffles.
The unique taste of these jet-black, marbled fungi makes them a highly desired gourmet food. A four-ounce truffle that fits in your hand will fetch about $250 wholesale and $500 retail.
Truffle is an edible fungi that, due to its scarcity and high-demand, has become a highly valued item.
Although Produce Blue Book just declared mushrooms one of the year’s top five food trends, North Carolina has long been a truffle top dog. And compared to hip newer products, such as mushroom coffee, truffles still offer lucrative opportunities for anyone comfortable with risk.
But what does it take to grow truffles? Who better to ask than Franklin — the first person to cultivate the Black Périgord truffle in North America?
Spending several hours with the Garlands provided some answers – and the opportunity to taste truffles.
A visit to the Garlands
The Garlands’ house rests at the end of a long, gravelly driveway, lined with pines. I drove until I spotted a sunshine-colored house with a giant metal statue of the Buddha in the yard. Franklin Garland built the house almost single-handedly in the 1970s. By its door sits a pink neon sign outlining two polka-dotted mushrooms.
The Garland’s house sits right beside their truffle field, where they produce all their own truffle products for their company Garland Truffles.
When I came inside, the Garlands, who own and operate Garland Truffles, seemed a little nervous to have a stranger in their home. But they immediately showed me some classic Southern hospitality, asking if I’d like anything to drink.
Franklin offered me a slice of buttered bread, topped with truffle slices.
The truffles hit me with an earthy flavor, reminiscent, just barely, of basic grocery store mushrooms. But it was much more intense. My mouth filled with a salty sweetness.
I sat on one of the Garlands’ bubble gum-colored leather chairs. Almost every inch of the wall was covered in art, including animal masks from Franklin’s home country, Guatemala.
Franklin, who speaks with an almost imperceptible Central American accent, lived there until eighth grade. He still organizes reunion events for his preschool class.
The Garlands rattled off a list of dishes that made my mouth water. Truffle omelets. Truffles in champagne. And truffle ice cream – which I also tried.
One dish, “Scallops in Black Tie,” features alternating layers of scallops and truffles placed into a puff pastry.
It’s clear the Garlands have a taste for the finer things. Betty gives off an almost regal air, exuding power.
Her hot pink lipstick matched her nails, and her hands were folded in her lap. At times, she leaned back, surveying me with serious, piercing blue eyes, as if to size me up. Her legs were crossed, showing off snakeskin heels. Her voice was a deep Southern drawl, smooth like a shot of good whiskey.
Betty Garland, though it was her husband, Frank, who started the company, also owns and operates it.
If the Garlands have truffles to sell, they can get a table at pretty much any restaurant, including three-Michelin-star establishments, such as The French Laundry in Napa Valley.
But this success took a long time. Franklin planted his first orchard in 1980, and he didn’t produce a single fungus until 1992. Waiting this long is typical, and it’s partially why truffles are so rare and expensive.
What it takes to grow a truffle
Truffles rely on mutually beneficial relationships with trees, so they are typically grown in orchards. The Garlands inoculate hazelnut and oak trees with truffle spores.
Franklin first tasted truffles in 1979, during a trip to France with his dad. They toured several truffle orchards, and Franklin tasted his first truffle dish, an omelet. He fell in love and purchased 500 inoculated trees.
Planting those trees in North Carolina’s acidic soil was challenging. Truffles need basic soil, with a pH as high as 8. So the Garlands poured copious amounts of lime rock on the ground to raise its pH.
The truffle field, where the Garland’s grow their crop.
Truffles are more difficult to harvest than other crops that take multiple years to produce, such as fruit trees. You can see apples peeking out from their branches, but truffles hide underground.
That’s why you need a dog. The Garlands now use standard poodles, which have a sense of smell between 700 and 1,000 times stronger than humans. They are trained to paw the ground at spots where they smell truffles.
But success requires more than these tools. You also need to be willing to try anything.
A curious mind pursues the bottom line
“I have many, many trades in my background,” Franklin said. “I was what was called a Renaissance man. I did everything myself. Have you read ‘Walden’? A little Thoreau? A little Emerson? You teach yourself. You live your life how you want. So I did.”
Frank and Betty Garland have been married for 27 years. They have been in business together since the early nineties.
Franklin came to North Carolina after earning undergraduate degrees in math and psychology from Carnegie Mellon University. After visiting his brother, who was pursuing a doctoral degree in the Tar Heel state, he compared the sunny weather to Pittsburgh’s unbearable winters and moved.
Between 1973 and 1974, Franklin bought farmland and started a greenhouse business with his brother. They mainly grew off-season tomatoes.
Almost 20 years passed between then and the day Franklin found his first truffle. It’s almost difficult to keep track of all the ways he stayed occupied.
He completed three associate’s degrees at Alamance Community College (ACC): manufacturing technology, electronics engineering technology and biomedical equipment technology. These endeavors were mainly driven by pure curiosity.
He bought tools and “pretended” he was a carpenter.
“No one else knew what they were doing either,” Franklin said.
He “sold himself” as an engineer and worked in the electronics communication industry for roughly six years.
He taught night classes at ACC, and he was eventually promoted to head of its Digital Electronics Department, after a sabbatical professor for whom he was covering decided to retire permanently.
And somewhere during that time span, Franklin also found time to build a house.
Frank Garland was the first person to cultivate the Black Périgord truffle in North America.
These stories paint a picture of a mad genius who could build a rocket ship with paperclips and a match. But they also emphasize Franklin’s unwavering belief in himself. It’s surely this belief that gave him the guts to risk it all in the truffle trade.
“You can do anything you set your mind to. And if you screw up, you fix it. But you’re only going to screw up a small percentage of the time,” Franklin said. “I’ll work on my own cars, on my tractor. I take it apart, and put the engines together. What happens when you break off a bolt or something like that? You learn how to fix it.”
And Franklin isn’t afraid that sharing what he’s learned will generate too much competition.
The Garlands have willingly stimulated competition by selling inoculated trees and donating them to a North Carolina Department of Agriculture experimental station. Franklin also received a grant from the North Carolina Tobacco Trust Fund to help 50 farmers replace tobacco farming with truffle cultivation. He provided each farmer with 200 truffle trees.
Although the Garlands have tried to help others by spreading the truffle gospel, Franklin is a self-described capitalist, bottom-line.
“There’s no reason why you can’t take advantage of the system you’re living in. 100 percent independence, it’s impossible,” Franklin said.
The Garlands will sell people truffles. They’ll sell people trees. But they won’t sell them the technology.
When I asked how much it would cost people to inoculate their own trees, he subtly deflected:
“More than it would cost for them to buy from us, how’s that?”
He let out a good-natured chuckle – and kept his secrets.
