black truffle
November 27th, 2011
The morning after Homage to Cataluña we were a bit tired to say the least. I rummaged around the fridge looking for something fortifying to cook for brunch and came across a black truffle, quail eggs and steak. All of which sounded great!
coriander, garlic and mushrooms
I fried up some coriander, garlic and mushrooms in olive oil, as an accompaniment to the steak and eggs.
fried quail's eggs
The quail eggs proved to be a bit tricky – the shells seem to be tougher than chicken eggs, so I broke a few yolks. I saved those for later – broken yolks don’t looks as good as 6 perfect eggs in a pan.
minute steak
The steaks were thin, so they only required about 30 seconds a side – we grated the black truffle on top.
The truffle came from the Boqueria on Friday morning, where there was a local Catalan produce market, outside the main area, selling cheese, honey, sausages, etc. Black truffles are less strong than white truffles, but nevertheless it had a delicious pungent, earthy smell and flavour. Afterwards I scrambled the broken yolked quail eggs and ate them with some truffle oil – I couldn’t get enough of the taste!
N.B. I learnt a fantastic tip from Keith Floyd years ago in his TV series Floyd on France: if you put 6 eggs into an airtight container for a few days with a truffle, the eggs will become flavoured by the truffle and you can use the truffle for something else as well!
I´ve just gone to have a peek in my fridge to see if I had a truffle in there…damn, nothing! We saw a brilliant programme the other night about truffle hunting dogs…must try to train my mutts 😉 This looks like a well deserved meal for you all. Hope you got some rest afterwards!
You must – if you’ve got mushrooms in those hills, there must be truffles!
More lunch tomorrow…
Edit: …and the steak had me fully restored – I went out for a long walk around Barrio Gótico and the Christmas Market in front of the cathedral 😉
I was so jealous of that truffle, gutted that nobody brought anything to grate it over the popcorn with.
I think the oil was probably better than the actual truffle for popcorn. The truffle was relatively cheap though – there was a stall in the Boqueria just by the people who bring the vegetables in to sell (not the regular inside bit).
Sexy food. I have a truffle slicer that still, sadly, remains a virgin.
That’s very sad, but you could change that – it’s truffle season 😉
Good God a Virgin Truffle Slicer! The mind Boggles!
There’s that Floyd again, i loved that guy.. I have never eaten truffle, nor have i even seen a truffle and I am positive there are not truffles out here, though I would train my pig to look for them if there were, and if i had a pig. c
Floyd was brilliant and probably the best TV chef. I think you should get a pig, there are definitely truffles in America 😉
I loved Floyd and I loved Clive his cameraman too. I am getting a pig too. Change of topic! My daughter is going to Barcelona soon for a week and Tanya suggested you may know some good places for her to eat, she works in a Spanish restaurant in London and loves good food but on a budget. Our Chica said that you know everything about BARCELONA!! c
I watched some Floyd clips after posting – he does it so much better than the new chefs!
I’m in the middle of posting an excellent Barcelona restaurant at the moment (La Mar Salada). When I’m done I’ll email you my friend Oli’s restaurant list 😉
Thank you, That would be great. My daughter works at Moro in London so she is excited about going to Barcelona and getting off the tourist tracks and getting a sense of the real thing. .. c
Moro’s great – I’ve eaten there 😉
we were hoping you liked it!!
Very much so 😉