Although butter is divine, I’ve recently been exploring other things that can be done with it to add quick flavour to otherwise more mundane dishes. Butter is a good preserver of more delicate aromatics which means you can use them for longer and have them to hand in your fridge.
Truffle Butter:
I love truffles, but there are only fresh for such a short time. I just bought an early season truffle from Tasmanian Truffles in Deloraine. It is great to be able to buy directly from the producer and even better, they cost less than from a store. I ordered my truffle Sunday night and it was with me in Sydney by Tuesday morning, packed in a cool box and special packaging to let the truffle breathe, similar to the packs with the one-way valve that coffee beans come in. I’ve now made a few dishes from it, most popular being a truffle and mushroom mac and cheese.
I decided to use some of the remaining to make truffle butter. It is beyond easy – simply soften 150g good quality butter (I used the Lurpak because I had some in the fridge), grate over truffle (around 10g) add a pinch of salt and mix. Spoon into a clean jar and you are done!
Also, don’t forget to fend off any lurking cats!
I’ve learnt the hard way to cover my softening butter on the benchtop or otherwise I come back to tongue marks on the top… This is Igor, pretending he’s not interested in my butter.
Uses: This morning I had an egg on toast but instead of using regular butter, spread my toast with the truffle butter. It enhances something as mundane as that and took it to a whole other level of deliciousness.
Another way to use it to great effect is when finishing steak – put a knob on top of the stead as it’s resting and let it melt in.
Another good use for truffle butter is roast chicken – rub some on the outside or under the skin if you can be bothered before roasting.
The good thing about truffle butter is that the flavour is subtle and adds a mysterious something that if you didn’t tell people what it was, they may not be able to guess. This works for the family too – it reduces the number of times you hear “I don’t like that so I’m not going to eat it” before they’ve even tried it. The downside is if everyone starts liking it, then there will be less for me!
The Curated Condiment 