ChefJohnny

As requested: Pork Trotters 6 ea Pig trotters 1 kg WHITE mirepoix (onions, fennel, leek, pear/apple) 1 L White wine 4 L Chicken Stock 10 oz Apple Juice 10 ea Black peppercorns 20 ea Parsley stems 2 ea Bay leaves 1/2 bu. Thyme 2 ea Star anise - Sweat mirepoix in EVO - Add aromatics and wine -> Reduce to sec* - Add trotters -> cover with HOT chicken stock - Bring to boil -> Cover with cartouche and foil - Braise @ 325F for 6 hours ( +/- ) - Cool in cuisson* - Remove with spider -> strain, reduce, and reserver cuisson - Clean trotters (remove bones, cartilage, and inside membrane, etc.) - Reserve clean skin Now, you can go a couple different ways at this point. You can serve it hot, the braised meat. I like to serve it with a simple cassoulet of white beans, tomato concasse, green beans, yellow wax beans, etc.) Or, you can brunoise* and fry the skin in a little butter until crispy. Add that to the shredded meat with 1# of buerre pomade*, chopped tarragon, chopped parsley, brunoise*, and some finished veal sauce*. Roll it into cylinders and you have an incredible trotter rillette. * There are a few terms in this that people may or may not know, so heres a little explination. - sec : Meaning to reduce a liquid until the pan is basically dry, but with still a little moisture left. - cuisson : braising liquid - brunoise : 1) a 1/16" dice 2) 1/16" of carrot, purple top turnip, and leek tops (refer to the French Laundy cookbook) - finished veal sauce : At TFL , any "finished sauce" meant the finished fortified sauce of whatever dish it used for, i.e. veal, duck, lamb, squad, etc. A fine substition is demi glace or, even better, bordelaise sauce. If you have anymore questions on this, feel free to ask! Enjoy the trotters!!!!! -Chef Johnny

Glad I could help!

MMMMM.... Trotters!!! One of my favorite things to cook AND eat! So cheap. So simple. Yet sooooo much amazing flavor if cooked correctly. Ive got a great recipe for braised trotters we used to use at The French Laundry. If you, or anyone would like it, Id be happy to PM or email it to you. Its quite large (yet incredibly simple), hence my reason for not wanting to post it. We actually just broke a whole 90# pig the other day. On that note, we are doing a "Degustation of Birkshire Farms Pork." Crispy Braised Belly, Roasted Chop, and "Tete du Couchon". Simply amazing. On a side note, Gene Simmons is coming in this Saturday for his birthday and this is on his tasting menu! ROCK ON KISS!!! Anyway, back to the subject at hand, the trotter recipe is basically a white braise, then cooled in the cuisson, then broken down. Id be happy to provide some more suggestions on how else to serve it. -Chef Johnny

I definitly recommend this technique, simply to have some truffles on hand. And, FYI, a good use for the resulting stock.... use it to make a black truffle risotto.

As far as the egg yolk idea, and not having to worry about raw eggs(which i am not opposed to) you can do a TFL recipe we used alot. Its an egg emulsion. Take some 9 minute yolks and emulsify EVO, sherry vin, and S&P. Its still a bright yellow, and tastes of egg and olive oil. Great sauce too. Im going to play around with that idea soon. Hopefully have my Egg "ravioli". -John

The poaching and freezing of truffles really has only one point. To extend thier "shelf-life." At TFL, we poached them in mushroom stock, which subsequently made a truffle stock, which was then used on various dishes. You do not need to dry them at all. No special actions are needed. Just softly poach the truffles until they are soft, then shock them in an ice bath. We would them cryovac them with a little of the poaching liquid. For a home cook without a cryovac machine, I would recommend freezing the truffles in a small container with the poaching liquid, so that frost does not occur on the truffles. If, on the other hand, you do have a cryovac machine, cryovac the truffles and just poach until soft i.e. sous vide. Hope this helps. - Chef Johnny *edit* - As far as re-using and re-freezing, there is no problem. But when you freeze them, I would definitly not recommend using the truffles for shaving, as thier structure is different. We use frozen truffles in risottos and powders, hache, etc.