White truffles are usually eaten raw, typically shaved atop a dish, correct?

Cardboard?! I would be mighty angry with the supplier if that was the case.

One of the best meals I've ever had in late December involved one course after another with dishes flecked with black truffles. A tiny roast chicken with black truffles tucked under the skin and studding the crisp surface.... This was in the countryside way outside of Florence in a small restaurant run upstairs in the home of an Italian husband and his American or Scottish wife--or vice versa.

I have also enjoyed a wonderful burrata at Dino's, flown in from Naples that morning.

I wonder, though, as much as lots of college-tuition money and a connection to the kitchen of one of this area's best restaurants might help you acquire really good truffles, if there might be something to locavorism in this case. A generous pile of the more costly mushrooms grown in Pennsylvania could be special, depending on your plans for preparing fungus.

I don't know if the mushroom suppliers are showing up at the Dupont market on December 24 (which is operating both the 24 & the 31st, if an hour later on the latter). I was disappointed with King's Oysters that I bought at Whole Foods; they weren't as flavorful as the ones at the market. The quality may depend on the day of the week and I am sure WF & the market are not the only places to shop for them.

Once the supplier was my friend Dan, so complaining to him would have been ungracious, the second time they were better, though not what they have been at Il Laboratorio or CityZen. Unfortunately, I haven't had enough truffling experience to cast blame about. Were they mishandled? Shaved too thick? Are truffles the fish of the fungus world, wonderful when bought off the boat by a well-connected chef, but aging quickly and badly under the flourescent lights of Fresh Fields? I like to be confident before I raise a ruckus. Plus, it's not like there were any left to return and -- as been pointed out repeatedly, it's a bit disingenuous to complaing after you've eaten them.


A well-taken point. But sometimes, only tuber melanosporum will do. Besides, we're entertaining the vegetarians soon and mushrooms will surely be on the menu, in quantity, that night.

Thanks for the great report on the truffles. This is one of the most inspired uses of leftovers I've read; the sausages sound wonderful.


I happen to love the writing in The Zuni Cafe Cookbook, though my favorite is the story of the drunk reaching in the window to steal a pig's head out of a stockpot rather than any of the nostalgia. I also like the long-winded recipes because it's interesting to learn how such an exacting cook thinks; some of the fussiest instructions prove very worthwhile when it comes to results.

I agree about cloying sentimentality. Same goes for the chipper, bright, peppy stuff. Barbara Tropp in her restaurant cookbook is just a bit grating in her asides. I usually find the appeal of wordy cookbooks a matter of presentation and substance. You can always skip the introductory material if it's all superfluous blather to you. It's when the author can't write, didn't hire a collaborator, and has very little to say that the prose becomes precious and irritating. This is especially true when autobiographical material is of little interest to a reader who becomes increasingly uncomfortable when it's clear how profoundly the business of "setting up" a recipe matters to the author. On the other hand, when a book concerns regional cooking, carefullly researched and skillfully presented historical information is as welcome to me as the recipes.

Sorry, Porcupine.

At Dino, I enjoyed a very fresh burrata that was sourced from Naples.

We shaved off the last of the last truffle last night, part of a ludicrously mis-matched dinner, half of which was the leftover Christmas Cajun prime rib turned -- with the help of some onion confit and some bodega provolone -- into G-d's own cheesesteak, and the other half of which was baked potatoes with butter, a bit of sour cream and a good chunk of truffle. After a week in the house and a bit of slicing, the truffle had lost significant strength. We'd decided to accompany this feast with a Cary Grant movie (I Was a Male War Bride, for the curious. eh, but still Cary Grant) and had thus to dine in the finished basement, until recently infused with a cat-piss smell that was not the result of shitty Kiwi SB, but of untrained kitties. Before snarfing down I took a big whiff ofthe room,to be sure that my meal was not to be denatured by an unpalatable odor. The cool thing was not that the cat smell had been eradicated -- though that was critical -- but that from feet away, the smell of warm truffle filled the room. And, though weakened, the taste of truffle rested on the palate for minutes after each bite of otherise humble baked potatoes, the way an exceptional wine lingers after every sip.

I wouldn't spend the rent on these guys. But given that you can spend $200 on a mediocre restaurant meal in DC, or be transported by the an ounce of truffles and two baked potatoes (or four eggs or a pound of pasta), I'd go to McD's one Friday night soon and eat simply, with someone I liked, the day after.

Cheers.

You know, if you're a very, very good girl, you get to have these sausages as your post P-Funk, post walk back from Constitution Hall to Adams Morgan, post being thrown out of the Pharaoh, 5-in-the-morning snack - sauteed with apples, onions and bacon and accompanied by a damned fine '98 Vieux Chateau Certan Pomerol. Waitman, you are officially the best home cook I know.

You know, those fuckers aren't cheap. But looking back over four meals with a dozen people, all made special by the little tubers(but mostly by the friends I am lucky to have), it was a damn fine investment. And having truffles lying around the house is almost better than having a crumpled wad of twenties in your jeans -- you can effortlessly make any moment swell.

Y'all should call Gloria. I'll lend you my shaver.

They are fungi, not tubers, right?

"Truffles will get you through times of no money, better than money will get you through times of no truffles?"
Hmmmmm.

I don't know if its because I've been a good girl, but those sausages were really damn good. Thanks for the grub, Waitman.

They are indeed fungi* but their proper name is Tuber melanosporum, hence my usage.

* What did the mushroom say to his bartender? "I don't know why I can't meet a nice girl. I'm a fun guy."

Start with French Laundry mushroom stock, then add dried porcinis, chanterelles, golden oyster, hen-of-the-woods, and a few shiitake. Cook down in stock, then whiz in a blender until the motor starts smoking. (If you're feeling masochistic, run it through a tamis.) Finish with cream, then serve hot with a generous shaving of black truffles. Almost the essence of funk.

So my wife picked me up a handful of what I assume are black winter truffles (they're dark on the inside).

I've already taken a giant bite out of one of them (I've wanted to do that for years), but I wanted to take an informal poll:

What else should I do with 'em?

What kind of truffles and how much did they cost? "Winter Truffles" are not "real" truffles in the sense of being the hugely expensive and aromatc types your gourmands freak out over. But they can be tasty, nonetheless)

Heather served a nice pureed mushroom soup with truffles shavedon top (you do have a shaver, right? ); scrabled eggs with truffles is considered a traditional deliocacy, true afficianados will scramble them slowly, the French way (bien sur) in a bowl placed over a pot of boiling water; sliced over pasta or backed potatoes...

In other words, find something tasty but delicate/neutral and putt eh truffles on top just long enough to warm them. Thomas Keller shaves white truffles over a muchroom risotto spike with truffle oil and whipped cream, the missus and I sliced a layer into the middle of a Pommes Anna, and ground some into the Boudins Blancs.

They were $999/lb truffles from Wegman's. I assumed they were "Winter" as opposed to the less sought after "Summer" because the price went up with the changing of seasons from $299/lb to $999/lb.

Price sounds about right. I've seen truffles described as "winter truffles" that were not in fact the offical tuber melanosporum, and so am cautious around the term.

Are they pretty fresh? I have always been wary of buying them there are there is no telling how long that have been sitting in the rice.

I've never handled fresh truffles before, so I really have no idea. They're not particularly pungent, so probably not. But they come from my wife, so they will taste better then the finest fresh ones.

That's a really good price. Balducci's had them for $1499/lb. a month ago.

They're probably fresher.