Lone Linguine With White Truffle Oil

Asked by craig74. Answered on 12th January 2014

Full question

I would like to make Nigella's Lone Linguine with White Truffle Oil. However, I am a little confused regarding the purchase of the truffle oil. All I have been able to find is olive oil with "white truffle aroma" added to it. Is this what I should use, or is there something else I should be looking for? Thank you for you help.

Our answer

Truffle oil can be made in two ways, by soaking truffles in oil to infuse the oil with flavour or by adding the aroma of truffle to an oil. The first method will give a very natural flavour but is extremely expensive and it is very difficult to find an infused truffle oil.

Most commercial truffle oil is made by mixing olive oil with 2,4-dithiapentane. This is one of the chemicals that make up the truffle's flavour and aroma. Hence most oil you will find will be labelled as oil "with white truffle aroma". 2,4-dithiapentane is only one of the compounds found in a natural truffle and this flavour can be quite assertive, hence some people don't like the flavour of commercial truffle oil and Nigella only suggests using a few drops of truffle oil in her Lone Linguine recipe (from Kitchen).