Salade Demi-Deuil

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Digital kitchen scale
• •Small saucepan
• •Small stiff truffle brush
• •Very sharp chef's knife or slicing knife
• •Two nested plain round cutters or piping tips, about ¾ to 1 inch and ⅜ to ½ inch (18 to 25 mm and 8 to 12 mm)
• •Chilled oval serving platter

Instructions

1. 1

   Cook and chill potatoes

   Put the unpeeled potatoes in a small saucepan with the cold water and the tablespoon of salt. Bring them slowly to a bare simmer, then cook for 18 to 22 minutes, until a fine skewer enters the center with only faint resistance. A rolling boil knocks them about and bursts their skins; gentle water keeps the flesh dense enough to cut. Drain at once, peel while warm, and chill for 30 minutes. If one potato splits, chill it immediately and use its firm center. If it has turned fluffy throughout, cook another, because the rings require sound flesh.

   A waxy potato is essential. Floury potatoes may be excellent under a roast, but here they crumble before the black-and-white pattern reaches the platter.
2. 2

   Emulsify the mustard cream

   Reserve 1 tablespoon of the measured cream for rescue. Whisk the Dijon mustard, vinegar, sauce salt, and white pepper until perfectly smooth, then add the remaining cream in a thin stream while whisking steadily. The sauce should lightly coat a spoon and still run from it. If it turns grainy or separates, don't pour it out. Ça se rattrape: put the reserved cream in a clean bowl and whisk in the broken sauce one teaspoon at a time. If no rescue is needed, whisk in the reserved cream at the end. Loosen an overly thick sauce with chilled water by the teaspoon, then refrigerate it.

3. 3

   Cut the inverse rings

   Brush fresh truffles clean and dry them thoroughly; blot preserved truffles until their surfaces are no longer wet. Cut four potato coins and four truffle coins of equal thickness, about ⅛ inch (3 mm). Stamp each coin first with the larger cutter, then with the smaller cutter centered inside it. Fit the potato centers into the truffle rings, and the truffle centers into the potato rings, making four of each form. Keep every sound offcut. If a ring cracks, send it to the julienne and cut another. C'est la même grammaire: matched thickness, matched cutters, opposite colors.

4. 4

   Cut equal juliennes

   Cut all remaining truffle and its offcuts julienne-fashion into match-shaped rods about 1½ mm square and 1¼ inches (3 cm) long. Weigh the finished truffle julienne; it should give about 80 to 90 g. Cut the chilled potato to the same dimensions, then weigh out exactly the same amount as the truffle. The scale decides the equality, not the apparent size of the handfuls. This equal proportion is the dish and must stay; the matched cutters were brigade scaffolding, and the piping tips have already replaced them honestly.

   Use a sharp knife and cut straight down. Sawing compresses the potato and tears the truffle, while a clean julienne keeps both ingredients distinct under the sauce.
5. 5

   Dress with restraint

   Place the equal juliennes in a chilled bowl and lift them together gently with two forks. Add the mustard cream one tablespoon at a time, folding after each addition, until every matchstick carries a fine sheen but no sauce collects underneath. If too much sauce goes in, lift the solids into a clean bowl with a slotted spoon and leave the excess behind. Ça se rattrape. Never correct overdressing with potato alone, because that would break the equal ratio that defines the salad.

6. 6

   Compose the platter

   Arrange the dressed julienne in a low oval on a chilled serving platter. Around it, alternate the eight ornaments: one black truffle ring with a pale potato center, then one pale potato ring with a black truffle center. Repeat until the border closes. Serve cool rather than numb from the refrigerator, ideally within an hour of cutting the truffle. Add nothing else. The sharp ivory sauce and the black-and-white dress have finished the work. À table!

Chef Tips

• •This is a truffle dish, not a potato salad scented with truffle. Seek ripe black winter truffles, Tuber melanosporum, with firm flesh and a perfume that reaches you before the truffle reaches your nose.
• •Outside the fresh season, whole preserved black truffles packed in their own juice are the classical pantry's honest answer. Drain and dry them well. Truffle oil and pale summer truffle cannot supply the black flesh, firm cut, or full perfume the dish requires.
• •Use heavy cream, not half-and-half or a fat substitute. The mustard needs cream with enough body to form a stable cold emulsion and cling without running. We don't apologize for cream.
• •Serve the salad as a small first course with dry Champagne or a restrained white Burgundy. Strong oak, sweet wine, raw onion, and assertive herbs all talk over the truffle.

Advance Preparation

• •Cook, peel, and chill the potatoes up to one day ahead. Keep them whole and tightly covered, then trim and cut them shortly before assembling the salad.
• •The mustard cream can be made up to four hours ahead and refrigerated. Whisk it briefly before dressing the juliennes, loosening it with a few drops of chilled water if it has tightened.
• •Cut the truffle and assemble the salad no more than one hour before serving. Keep it chilled, then let it stand for about ten minutes before it reaches the table so the truffle's perfume can open.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 110g)