The question I now ask myself in truffle season: is this the year I cook Analiese Gregory's potato and black truffle gallette?
With a recipe from How Wild Things Are
For the last few years there’s a question I’ve asked myself at this time of year. It’s not how much firewood do we have, or whether it’s finally time to tick one of the last boxes on my West Australian Citzenship test (not a thing, but there’s those who would have us secede) and winter in Bali. It’s not even, will I cook with a black truffle, as that’s a given at this stage. No, it’s will this be the year that I finally cook Analiese’s truffle and potato galette?
Image: Sarah Hewer
As I’ve written before my experience of Australian grown black truffle (Tuber melanosporum) and the industry itself has been quite deep over the years. Over the truffle years I ate a lot of it each year at restaurants and dining events (some good, some not so much), but my favourite experiences have often been simple uses at home. Ask a chef how they (any) truffle at work and often you’ll get a robotic spiel about seasonality and respecting the ingredient (some really do mean it and I’m there for that, but others I’m not so sure). But ask them what they do with it at home (those illicit moments that are probably predicated on half-inching a bit from work) and their eyes widen, the tone conspiratorial. Yes, on eggs is always there, or in a very cheesy toastie. And rightly so. They’re both up there for me, as is a tip I picked up from farmer and food writer Matthew Evans - layered between slices of bread fried in pig fat. I’m also partial to using truffle butter on popcorn - don’t knock it til you’ve tried it.
More recently it’s been the recipe of one of Evans’ fellow Huon Valley-ers, that’s been occupying my thoughts. I watched Analiese Gregory cook a potato and black truffle galette at Truffle Kerfuffle back in 2021 (it’s on this weekend as it happens, and if you’re in WA and even curious about black truffle then rug up, throw yourself in the car, and follow your nose or directions to Fonty’s Pool in Manjimup) and it’s stayed with me. I dropped hee a message this week and asked if she’d mind me sharing it here. The recipe is below, or if you’ve got her book How Wild Things Are it’s in there as well.
I’ve written about Analiese many time before and you’re likely to know her from restaurant world, said book, TV and the socials. If you’re not acquainted, she’s the former head chef of dearly departed Franklin in Hobart, and counts Quay, Michel Bras, Le Meurice, Mugaritz and The Ledbury on her CV. She’s the dictionary definition of a hospo gun. Now, you’ll find her on the cusp of opening an on farm dining room down in Tasmania and plying her trade far beyond the valley.
As I watched Analiese make the galette all those years ago I thought I’m definitely making this, albeit without the use of a mandoline (I’ve always fancied getting all the cheffy kit but I do have an attachment to my fingertips). It’s a take on pommes sarladaises, which she picked up working at The Ledbury in London.
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