I need your help. In exchange for not April Foolin’ you guys, I need you to help me review this story and figure out whether or not it’s a joke. That’s fair, right?
The story is actually an article supposedly written by Gwyneth Paltrow for L.A. Weekly. In the article, she gives a recipe for quail egg pasta with black truffles, “a quick fix for busy moms everywhere.” The recipe requires lots of fancy ingredients, such as a black truffle that, if you can’t find locally, you can order online for a little over four hundred dollars (Gwyneth calls it “a little exy but so worth it”). She goes on with her special brand of pretentiousness and failed humor, and for the most part, I can really believe her saying it. But some parts are pretty out there, like when she mentions her children taking classes like “Microbiotics in the 18th Century” and “Beekeeping for Urban Babies.” Even then though, I really don’t think it’s completely impossible that this is real.
Check it out for yourself, then let me know, ok?
My close friend and confidant Victoria Beckham and I were just discussing over brunch how stressful it is being busy moms in heels. It’s insane. Between reading emails, making vision boards with Isabel Marant, and researching the most effective psyllium husk, there’s very little time to whip together a quick, healthy, committed and tolerant weekday night dinner for your family.
So I created this recipe for a yummy Quail Egg Pasta that is so truly amazing and entirely original but most importantly: a quick fix for busy moms everywhere.
Quail Egg Pasta with Black Truffles
Serves: 4
Time: 2.5 hours2 cups Italian “00” flour (I get mine when I raid Mario Batali’s home pantry but you can find it at Italian specialty markets or online)
6 organic, grass-fed, free-range quail eggs, hatched within 7 miles of your condo
1 farm fresh chicken egg with the same aforementioned qualifications
1/2 cup browned butter
1 black truffle (If you can’t find this at your local grocer, order online from Dean & Deluca for $430. A little exy but so worth it)
white truffle oil (samesies)
10-year aged artisan Parmigiano Reggiano cheese from a tiny farm in Modena, Italia
organic Italian parsley
fleur de sel (if you don’t know what this is you should just stop reading immediately)
bottle of dry red wine*1. First, make the pasta by combining the flour and the chicken egg and knead until perfect. Then put it through your electric KitchenAid attachment which, like my $85 IceMilk apron, is a must-have for any cook. Then, hang the pasta for an hour to dry. I recommend using a Serge Gainsbourg album as your kitchen timer. When the music is over, the pasta is ready for you to throw into a huge pot of boiling water until al dente.
2. Next, brown your butter. Heating too quickly will result in a burnt flavor instead of nutty one. Sometimes I’ll do it a few times to get it just right. No worries though, just pour the bad stuff in a stainless steel tub labeled “Failed Butter” and toss it in your compost pile. You’ll need extra butter if this is the case. Poach the quail eggs in a separate pot of boiling water. When it looks gorgeous, add the brown butter and quail eggs to the naked pasta. Next, drizzle with truffle oil, shave black truffle, and grate il formaggio over the top. Finally, sprinkle with some parsley and fleur de sel. Note: Twirling in a circle when sprinkling the fleur de sel increases longevity and consciousness.
3. Dude. This is such a delicious and a simple dinner idea for busy moms around the globe. My family and I often enjoy it when we’re in a rush between Apple’s “Microbiotics in the 18th Century” class and Moses’ “Beekeeping for Urban Babies” seminar at the London School of Pleasantries. And one time when Mario Batali stopped by at 3 a.m. unexpectedly for no reason (as he often does), I whipped this up and we ate, sang and laughed about the time a brick from my outdoor wood-burning oven fell and hit my husband in the head, which was actually the inspiration for “Clocks.” Freakin’ good times, yo.
Love,
gp*to drink while you’re cooking or just existing.
Well? What do you think?
I actually think Gwyneth has a decent sense of humor. She knows what people think about her and this is an obvious play on that persona. This actually makes me like her a little more! Well played, Gwynny, well played.
I think it’s meant as satire, but the joke is kind of on her when she is known as being so pretentious, we can’t tell when she’s really joking or just being herself.
It’s over the top, but so is her level of snobbery. Remember her list of essential “must have’s” for her home? Barf.
lol! she actually made me laugh! Hey at least she has a sense of humor about herself.
No. She doesn’t. That’s the sad thing. She’s a name-dropper and yet thinks she’s connecting with the “every-woman”
Truffles have no nutritional value.. but she loves the sad conflict of forcing the dog and hog to hunt the rare mushroom and the probability that this flavoring shroom will become extinct from too many humans consuming them.. Found approximately 1 foot (30 cm) under the ground, the vegetative part of the fungi — the mycelia — forms a symbiotic relationship with the roots of a variety of species of trees. Since they grow underground, truffles rely on animals to eat them and scatter their spores in order to reproduce. The strong odor of the mature truffle is what allows animals to locate them.
Truffle hunting is a lucrative business when they are in season, from fall through spring. In North America, raking back the soil and searching by sight is the usual method for harvesting. In Europe, hunters use truffle hogs and specially-trained dogs to sniff them out. The female truffle hogs become alert to the scent of the mature truffle because it is similar to the pheromones of the male hog’s saliva. The sow is difficult to hold back, however, and will readily eat the expensive delicacy if allowed to do so.
For this reason, many hunters have begun to use truffle dogs, with the Lagotto Romagnolo being the only breed specifically recognized for this trait as of 2009. Though they lack the innate ability of the hog to detect the scent, dogs can be specially trained to do so. The advantage comes when the truffle is located, as the dog is much less likely to eat it.
She is also majorly accessible in other ways, pandering to the time-crunched mom with such last-minute knowledge that those truffles, well if you don’t just have some–like, lying around in your condo, those are about $430 online, “samesies” goes for the surprise (super rare) ingredient of WHITE truffle oil. So, so far, the meal is costing you the price of a condo, plus the $860 for truffle ingredients. I think its time to cut a fancy boarder around the recipe and paste it to your vision board beside your condo, truffles and your artfully designed photo of Gwyneth with high heels sticking out of her eyes.
Clearly a joke. I don’t get all this Gwenyth hate. I think she is hilarious
Quail eggs are disgusting, this vapid self-centered woman gets more annoying every day. That poor ghost writer wrote a book for her and she refuses to acknowledge her. And the joke is not funny, it’s stupid like her.
this is hilarious. i think shes def kidding. “samesies”? for sure. specially the part about a few tries to brown butter. she is hilarious. i think she takes herself pretty seriously when it comes to food/health, but she is definitely NOT dumb. she knows how she comes across. love it. people need to lighten up. hate her? arent there better uses of that energy?