If you watch cooking shows then you’ve probably seen a judge scold a competitor for ruining his dish with a “truffle oil” finish. At the same time, restaurants of all kinds charge you a premium for anything that has “truffle” in any form. So who’s right? Does “truffle oil” enhance a dish or ruin it?
According to TasteAtlas, an experiential travel guide for traditional food, there is no question that “truffle-flavored oil” is not made from truffles. It is “a cheap oil with added synthetic truffle flavor.”
Their food experts label it, “Synthetic garbage sold as a luxury gourmet item” and “it gives customers the idea that truffles have an intense gas-like aroma.” They go on to explain that truffle oil is all a lie and a scam that “falsely represents a product that has nothing to do with truffles.”
Neither do truffle-flavored chips, ketchup, or chocolate; also tartufata, jar packaged truffles, cheese, and truffle sausages, as well as the vast majority of pasta and “truffle” frittatas in restaurants. In short, if you take the experts’ advice you’ll stay away from truffle-flavored dishes altogether.
The flavor that you think is truffle is an added “petroleum-derived product, the colorless 2,4-dithiapentane liquid” that is sourced for a few euros from Italy, Germany, or China, and it then ends up on your plates and in your refrigerators, pasta, tartufata, oils, cheeses, and sausages, but also in expensive delicacies with a prostituted label “truffles.” It’s described as an “intense gas-like smell,” while the aroma of real truffles is mild and complex.
Even if you think that you had real truffles on your plate you may have been deceived. The easiest way to fool customers is to add real truffles, of course using the cheapest and completely tasteless varieties, to truffle-flavored products. That’s where the black bits in truffle cheese and 5% of truffles in tartufata come from. Those are called “decorative truffles”, are dirt cheap and are there only to fool your eyes. The unpleasant taste—any taste at all– comes from that petroleum-processed “truffle oil”.
There are more than 60 classified truffle species, around 25 species are edible, and four of those are most commonly used. To avoid being scammed, remember that real truffles are prohibitively expensive, cannot be processed, frozen, cooked, sterilized, packaged, or stored. If you had a dish with an intense truffle flavor out of season – it was most definitely a scam as it is impossible to serve those truffles out of season.
Check the label of any truffle product, and even if they sell the regular truffle in a jar, all these products contain “aromas” or “flavorings.” This means, without exception, that the flavor does not come from truffles.
The natural aroma can be derived from any plant or animal, and it is used in processed food. Therefore, the added “natural aroma” does not mean that it comes from truffles.
The easiest way to deceive naive customers is to add real truffles, of course using the cheapest and completely tasteless varieties, to truffle-flavored products. That’s where the black bits in truffle cheese and 5% of truffles in tartufata come from.
Restaurants advertising fine dining and truffles mostly offer artificially flavored dishes in which cheap truffles are merely a decoration.
You will be served either a dish with tartufata (a sauce made with cream, cultivated mushrooms, cheap decorative truffles, and artificial truffle aroma) or a dish that’s topped with decorative truffle shavings. Still, if you remove the shavings, the fake smell and the fake taste of truffles remain.
If you’re willing to pay the price for truffles in a restaurant, then make sure they’re real. Avoid fraud by always asking restaurant staff if they use truffle flavorings or the real thing: pure truffles. Smell the dish before putting truffles on it and insist that the waiters grate them in front of you.
