Truffle Shuffle

Over the past few months I have watched all of the television series, Bones. If you haven't seen it, you need to. There are seven seasons on Netflix. You have no excuse! Anyway, the show takes place in the DC area and several times over the course of seven seasons, I've heard truffles referenced.

Any time I hear somebody referring to truffles, I wonder what they are. I mean, I know that there are chocolate truffles and that's what always comes to mind. But whenever I hear a fancy person talking about truffles or hear my favorite character on a TV show mention truffle pizza, I stop and think... they can't be talking about Lindt.

I generally chalk it up to truffles being something on par with caviar and don't dwell on the subject. That is, until I watched an episode recently that focused on truffles. Truffles that you dig up. Truffles that look like potatoes. Truffles which when cooked look like spaghetti?

I have to understand. What are truffles?

According to my handy-dandy Wiki, truffles are a type of subterranean mushroom. Oh? Mushrooms? I can get on board with that. I love mushrooms. Even if they are dug up with pigs.

But why, when Hodgins, <-- Hodgins, cooked truffles in the lab and asked Daisy,  <-- Daisy, to eat them, did they look like buttered spaghetti? A page on gourmetfoodstore.com which hails truffles as the all-mighty, tells me that pasta, rice, and potatoes are the holy truffle trinity and that you should always use the least amount of truffle you can to maximize the truffle flavor.  I can only assume that Hodgins cooked up the truffles with pasta. In a beaker.

My initial curiosity about truffles has been sated for the time being. I have to say, I would really like to try them someday and experience the flavor for myself.