No. 767

Truffle Garnishing

Garniture de Truffes

Raw truffles to be used whole for garnishings should be first peeled, then cooked for eight or ten minutes in some good Madeira. In case there be no fresh truffles on hand, then use the preserved ones which are considered excellent. For garnishing with truffles, cut them in slices, or olive shaped, or in quarters, or in small sticks, or else left whole; minced truffles are also used, prepared by cutting them into thin slices and sauteing them in butter and oil over a brisk fire; season and finish with a little Madeira or supreme sauce, or even chicken glaze (No. 398) or half-glaze (No. 400) well reduced and buttered.

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For the Modern Kitchen

Ranhofer assumes a kitchen with a truffle bin and a stockpot of chicken glaze at the ready. The method still works, but almost every element needs translating for a cook buying one truffle at a time.

The hinge: cook the truffle in wine, not waterEight to ten minutes in Madeira is a gentle poach that perfumes the truffle and firms it enough to slice cleanly. Simmer hard or go much past ten minutes and the aromatics, which are volatile, leave with the steam.
Which truffleRanhofer almost certainly has the black Perigord truffle (Tuber melanosporum) in mind, which tolerates heat, though the entry itself does not say. White Alba truffle behaves nothing like this and is best shaved raw over finished food rather than poached. Summer truffle (Tuber aestivum) is cheaper and much milder.
PeelingBlack truffles were commonly pared before use in this period, and the peelings were put to work in sauces and forcemeats rather than discarded. With today's prices, brush the truffle clean under cold water, dry it, and pare only the gritty or damaged spots.
"Preserved ones which are considered excellent"He means truffles preserved in tins in their own juice, a luxury item in 1894. The modern equivalent is a jar or tin of whole black truffle; the packing liquid is worth keeping and belongs in the sauce, not the sink.
MadeiraUse a dry to medium Madeira such as Sercial or Verdelho. Cooking Madeira sold with salt added will throw the seasoning off, since the liquid is meant to be reduced afterwards.
Olive shapedTourner en olive means working the piece into a small tapered oval with a paring knife (conventionally seven facets in modern teaching), the same family of cut used for potatoes and carrots in classic garnish work. It costs a great deal of truffle in trimmings; save every scrap for the minced version.
Brisk fireFor the minced truffles this means high heat in butter and oil together, the oil helping to keep the butter from blackening. A minute or two is enough; the sauteing is for gloss and seasoning, not for cooking through.
Chicken glaze and half-glazeRanhofer's cross-references are to reduced stocks and sauces. Chicken glaze is white stock boiled down to a syrup that sets solid when cold; half-glaze (demi-glace) is a reduced brown sauce. A spoonful of either, mounted with cold butter off the heat, is what binds the mince.
QuantityNo yield is given because this is a component, not a dish. One 30 g black truffle, sliced, garnishes four plates generously; minced, it will season a sauce for six.

A Little History

This entry comes from Charles Ranhofer's The Epicurean (1894), the enormous compendium he assembled over roughly three decades as chef at Delmonico's in New York, and it sits in a long alphabetical run of garnishes that reads more like a reference manual than a cookbook. That structure is the point: in the grande cuisine Ranhofer inherited from Careme's generation -- Escoffier was his contemporary, not his predecessor, and the Guide Culinaire came nearly a decade after this book -- a garnish was a named, standardised assembly that a cook was expected to know by rote, so a menu could specify a dish "a la Perigueux" or "aux truffes" and the brigade would produce the same thing every time. Truffles reached New York from France fresh in season and, presumably more often, in tins, and appeared on Delmonico's menus as a plain signal of expense. The tinned truffle he calls "excellent" was a relatively modern convenience in 1894, and it is what allowed an American kitchen to serve truffle garnish out of season at all.