Truffle & white bean soup

"There are two types of people who eat truffles: those who think truffles are good because they are dear and those who know they are dear because they are good."
J.L. Vaudoyer

I remember the first time my tongue tasted truffle. It was at Jacques Reymond in Melbourne, and my husband (first time I said husband, yikes) and I were partaking in our first degustation. I had no idea what was coming and I enjoyed not knowing.
And then, a small bowl of earthy brown soup arrived. Mushroom, I thought. I placed the spoon in my mouth and my eyes widened. Something strange, an all consuming flavour that I had never tasted before. It is a weird feeling to eat something and not know what it is. I had no idea what this flavour could be and it drove me to ask the waiter. Truffle soup madame. Truffles. I had heard about them, but had never been curious to try them. Oh how I had missed out. I loved truffles at first taste. And ever since I am always trying to eat them.

As fresh truffles are a little exxy I compromised (for now) by buying some truffle salt and white truffle oil. Ever since buying the white truffle oil I have been searching for ways to use it. As one of my guests tonight loves soup it all seemed to work out perfectly.

ease: 3/5.
prep time: 10mins.
cooking time:35mins.
total: 45mins.

taste: 4/5. Once again I made a lot of adaptations as this recipe is time consuming and a little difficult:

• I used canned cannellini beans, around 240g
• I added the beans, veg and stock (only 1.5L) immediately, I excluded the pancetta
• I used 1/2tsp of each of the herbs, dried
  
• I cooked it for 15mins before removing the veggies and adding the sweated shallots
• I then added the cream and cooked for an additional 15mins
• I blended the soup and added some truffle oil - I did not pass it through a sieve as it was already extremely runny

Everyone enjoyed this (dad asked for the recipe, then remembered I have a *website thingy*).
The truffle oil worked well with the tasty, maybe a little thin, soup. It definitely does not need salting.

would I make it again: Yes - I would add more beans next time though to thicken it up. It would probably be tastier with the pancetta but then I wouldn't be able to eat it - perhaps sprinkle some on top?

recipe: http://www.nordljus.co.uk/en/truffle-white-bean-soup