iapetus

For better or worse, I seem to have settled into a pattern when I'm in Rome ('cause I'm very happy where I go!). But I do get to new places usually. This time I finally visited Open Baladin. I knew it would be good, but I was shocked at just how tasty that burger was! There were a lot more selections available than on the menu you can find on-line. My burger had provolone, truffle mayo (I'm no mayonnaise fan ... unless you add truffles ) and guanciale. The meat itself was delicious. And I'd put that burger up against any I've had in the US.

Oh, and the beer was yummy, too! ^

Perche

Good burgers on good bread, I'm sure, but beware of truffle flavored anything. Truffle mayo, truffle oil, anything except for straight up truffles has a bad record in Italy, as well as in the USA. Mainly, because it doesn't have any truffles in it. It is a mixture of chemicals put together to smell and taste like truffles, but it doesn't contain any truffles. It's like making coffee out of chicory. There may be a resemblance in taste, but there's no coffee in it.

I hate to say it, but truffle mayo, truffle oil, or anything other than just plain old truffles is a chemical called 2,4-dithiapentane, made out of petroleum. It doesn't come from a mushroom like plant found under the ground, sniffed out by truffle hunting trained dogs. It's manufactured in a laboratory. Another name for it is methylthiomethane.

The 2,4-dithiapentane is then mixed with EVOO "Italian" olive oil, that often comes from Tunisia or Morocco, and doesn't contain any truffle. Your truffle mayo didn't contain any truffles. When I see anything on a menu, like truffle flavored sauce, truffle oil, truffle mayo, I stay away. I eat real white truffles when I'm in Torino or Tuscany in the Fall, when they come out. The rest of the year they are just not available.

PWMTrav

This is sometimes, but not always, true. There is real truffle oil on the market - meaning oil infused with actual truffle (as opposed to truffles pressed to extract oil, but who knows, that probably exists somewhere too I just haven't seen it).

You're safer buying truffle salt, although that can be fake too. But there is actual truffle oil out there. Your best bet is to taste it before buying, though. Too strong a flavor is indicative of synthetic - real truffles have a more subtle flavor, as do the genuine oils.

TObject

You should try asking a local for place to eat recommendations somewhere off-the-beaten path in Australia. The conversation would go something like this:
--- Where would you recommend eating?
--- Well, it depends. Do you like good food?
--- Yes.
--- Then nowhere, mate.

iapetus

Well, Perche, I guess you've got me. I have no way of knowing whether I was served spread with real or artificial truffles in it. How could I possibly?

What I do know is that the food was really tasty and that I enjoyed myself. It wasn't any one ingredient or the other that I liked, but rather the ensemble of the burger. I would recommend said brewpub/restaurant to friends, and I am probably going to go back on my next visit to Rome.


That said, my favorite coffee contains chicory in it, which I know and love for the taste of it! I enjoy it so much that I have it mail ordered to my house, as I don't get to Louisiana often enough.

Perche

I'm not sure about that. I've come across articles both in Italy and in the USA saying that there is no such thing as truffle oil.

Below are a few excerpts from this article: https://www.tastingtable.com/cook/na...s-priceonomics

"Sorry, There Are No Truffles in Your Truffle Oil. It's time to blow the lid off this farce."
"As Priceonomics puts it, “Truffle oil has been a remarkably successful con.”
“One of the most pungent, ridiculous ingredients ever known to chef,” Gordon Ramsay once told a competitor on MasterChef.
"Reaching for the oil is "a sure sign of someone who doesn't know what they're doing," Joe Bastianich said in the same episode.
“Fake truffle flavoring is one of those things that's especially upsetting, because not only does it taste like a bad chemical version of the real thing, it's the flavor that almost everyone now associates with truffles,” Jonathan Gold says."

Below is an excerpt of this article in Bon Appetit: https://www.bonappetit.com/test-kitc...le/truffle-oil

"The intense aroma and flavor of truffle oil doesn't come from actual truffles but a chemical compound that resembles it closely, often marked on the bottle label as "natural flavors."

It's pretty well documented in the NY Times:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/16/dining/16truf.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/15/o...chemicals.html

And I've come across the same type of articles in Italian newspapers and magazines, that truffle oil, truffle infused, truffle sauce, truffle flavored, etc., means no truffles. I'm not saying there can't be an exception to the rule, but it is pretty much the rule.

I've even seen truffle flavored french fries on the menu in Italian restaurants, and I know they contain no truffles.

PWMTrav

It's fine to be skeptical, but the genuine article exists. If you don't insist on the truffles being Italian (or European), this stuff is legitimate or it's the best fake on the planet. If the latter, I don't care, it's still good.

Also, going back to what iapetus ate, mayo is fantastic for flavoring with truffle scraps. Some of the flavors in truffles are water soluble, and an emulsion like mayo works way better to extract than oil does. But even if it's artificial, if it tastes good, eat it.

I keep a small bottle of the artificial truffle oil specifically to put on french fries. It tastes good and I'm not looking for subtlety there. Joe Bastianich can come get it himself from my cabinet if it's that offensive, but it's on the shelf right next to the genuine article, and white and black truffle salts.

iapetus

Thank you for posting those articles, Perche. I appreciated reading them, and I feel more educated on the topic. Now I will be a more educated consumer in the future.

That's sorta where I'm coming down on this topic. My point was that I really enjoyed the food that I had last week. And, unfortunately, I feel like that point kinda got hijacked. Can I still enjoy the food at Open Baladin? Sure, and I'm very happy to understand more about what I'm eating. In fact, that article answered a lot of questions I should have been asking myself (for example, why do the chef judges on Chopped have so much disdain for truffle oil?). And, actually I can think of a ton of good reasons that "truffle oil" exists; the principal argument against it would be that so many people do think they're eating a product made from real truffles.

Still, I have to wonder: is it too much to ask the chef actually see the truffles in the kitchen when they market an item containing truffles?

iapetus

If they're not putting real truffles (or truffle-esque Oregonian fungi) into that product, then they are clearly defrauding customers. Note that I'm not saying that they are; I'm just stating that I cannot reasonably interpret the claims on their website to mean anything other than that they actually put "truffles" into their product. OTOH, they claim that their truffle oil is made 100% from real truffles, which clearly isn't true, as I don't think mushrooms have much in the way of natural oils in them ...

Perche

Great post, iapetus. I'm sure you had a great meal, and hopefully, you now know that truffle oil contains no truffles.

Don't feel hijacked. It is totally normal for Italians to argue about food.

I remember one time, walking down the stairs in my apartment. Many of the elevators in Italy are open, they just have a gate in front. I could hear two people screaming at one another as they got on the elevator, and I was walking down the stairs. Once in the elevator, it only got worse. I thought they were going to kill each other.

As the elevator approached where I was walking down, I could finally understand what they were screaming at each other about. It was whether onion should be included in a particular pasta sauce, or whether it is forbidden to put onion in that type of sauce.

iapetus

Excellent point! ^

I'm familiar with this! It sounds like two of my colleagues in Rome, who, I think, would describe themselves as good friends. Their arguments start as back-and-forth exchanges that start getting more staccato and higher in pitch (at which point they quickly exceed my ability to understand them, given my current abilities to speak Italian) until I start getting really anxious, figuring a physical fight is about to break out. Then, just as I start to cringe, they stop. The conversation is over. The issue is resolved. And no one is angry. And then I remember that they are, after all, Italian.

I just haven't heard them about food yet ... I think.

PWMTrav

I completely agree. I don't need everything to be made the correct way - if something tastes good, it's inherently correct in some fashion.

I like the cheap, likely synthetic version on french fries - toss with that, some kind of grated, hard cheese, and parsley. I know what it is (or isn't) but it tastes good to me, so it stays.

Sciamano

Truffle trouble of which I don't want be part , Open Baladin is a great choice. If you want other beers and/or burgers advices in Rome, simply ask.

Perche

I agree the chef and management of that place are very well respected, and there is good food to be had. Below is an example of truffle oil without any truffles. Yesterday I happened to be looking for cheese in one of Marin County's very high end markets and saw some, "truffle oil."

None of the truffle oil or truffle salts have any truffles in it. They were invented in a laboratory in the 1970's, and don't even taste like truffles. They are olive or soybean oil, or table salt covered with the chemical 2,4-dithiapentane, which is distilled from petroleum, and doesn't even taste like truffle.

Every year there is a truffle festival in Napa Valley in January. It might be canceled in January, 2018 year because of the fires. But their website is very informative about this issue.

"If your only introduction to truffles has been through truffled popcorn, French fries, mac ‘n’ cheese or pizza, you may be upset to discover that you have never tasted a truffle at all. Those dishes were almost certainly made with so-called “truffle oil” or “truffle salt” — which are basically oil or salt mixed with a chemical compound called 2,4-dithiapentane.

There’s a reason these products aren’t made from actual truffles. Salt would quickly dry out any bits of truffle mixed with it and render them tasteless. Oil infused with truffles might acquire a slight truffle flavor, but that flavor would be ephemeral, dissipating long before the bottle reached you. You may find bits of truffle in these products, but they are mostly included as windowdressing. Truffle oil is actually a food science invention from the 1970s.

If you don’t believe it, check the label. The dead give-away is “truffle aroma” on the ingredients list. That’s an alternative description of 2,4-dithiapentane. True, the compound is a synthetic version of one of the elements found in real truffles — but it represents only one of the 20 or so volatile oils found there (none of which occurs in such an intense concentration).

Chef Ken Frank of La Toque, host chef of the Napa Truffle Festival, calls truffle oil “an abomination,” in part because its name misrepresents its contents, but more importantly, because the strong, one-dimensional flavor has changed diners expectations of what truffles should taste like, ruining their appreciation of the subtle, complex aroma and flavors that the real thing can bring to a dish.

But nevertheless, many people like it and find it delicious, whether or not it’s the real thing. There’s nothing to stop you from enjoying chemically flavored 2,4-dithiapentane oil on your popcorn. (Though it certainly sounds less appetizing when you call it that!) Just don’t be fooled into thinking that it has anything to do with truffles and that it accurately represents their delicate flavor."
http://www.napatrufflefestival.com/t...il-vs-truffle/

PWMTrav

It's sufficient to say most of it is synthetic, the real stuff is available if you look hard enough, and if you know that and still like it - eat it. Let's just leave it at that. Most of us aren't purists with respect to everything that we eat.