Truffle cream sauce is a satiny, luscious cream sauce that can be used on pasta, pizza, seared meats, and gratins. We love to make it with fresh black truffles, but truffle oil and truffle pate work as well!
This post may contain affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.
This truffle cream sauce is pure luxury. Grated black truffles, shallot, and garlic are sautéed in butter, simmered with white wine, and then gently cooked with heavy cream.
The truffle sauce can be used in a variety of dishes (gratins, savory bread puddings, creamed spinach), but I especially love to toss it with fresh handmade pasta, grated parmesan, and more shaved truffles.
Because if you have fresh truffles in your kitchen, why not?
how to make truffle cream sauce:
Add garlic and grated truffle, cook until fragrant.
Don’t skip this recipe if you don’t have fresh truffles!
There are so many truffle products out there that can do a great job of standing in for fresh truffles. My favorite is truffle pate and my least favorite is truffle oil, but use what you’ve got!
The beauty of this cream sauce is it’s more than just truffles and heavy cream. I use a lot of aromatics to build complexity in the sauce, so it will still be delicious with a variety of truffle products.
- Truffle pate: stir in 1 tablespoon at the end of cooking, add more to taste
- Truffle oil: stir in 2 teaspoons at the end of cooking, add more to taste
- Preserved truffles: stir in 2 tablespoons at the end of cooking, add more to taste
- Truffle salt: use in place of the kosher salt; taste and add more if needed
a few more tips:
- Use a microplane to grate fresh truffles.
- It exposes much more surface area to air, so more flavor gets released into your food. It's also one of the most efficient uses of this piece of black gold. You could mince the truffle, too, if you don’t have a microplane.
- The key to making a great pasta truffle cream sauce lies in liberal use of pasta water.
- It creates a silky sauce that drapes over the noodles and coats the ridges of every shape.
- Cream sauces tighten as they cool, so err on the side of a loose sauce.
- Store any unused fresh black truffles in the refrigerator, wrapped in paper towels, and kept inside a glass storage container.
- This will minimize moisture, slow mold growth, and help preserve the flavors of your fresh truffle for up to 1 week.
- Then grate the rest of the truffle and make truffle butter or truffle aioli!
truffle cream sauce
Truffle cream sauce is a luscious sauce for pasta, pizza, and meat-- to name a few. Fresh truffles, truffle oil and truffle pate work great!
- Prep Time: 5 minutes
- Cook Time: 30 minutes
- Total Time: 35 minutes
- Yield: 1 ¼ cups
- Category: Pasta
- Method: Stove
- Cuisine: American
- Diet: Gluten Free
Ingredients
- 2 tbsp butter
- 1 small shallot, chopped
- 1 garlic clove, chopped
- 2 tbsp grated fresh black truffles (from ½ oz), can substitute truffle pate
- ½ cup dry white wine
- 1 ½ cups heavy cream
- kosher salt
- freshly ground black pepper
Instructions
- Melt butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Add shallot and cook until soft and translucent, about 3 minutes. Add garlic and truffle and cook until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Stir in white wine and simmer, uncovered, until only a few tablespoons remain, about 10 minutes.
- Add cream, season with salt and pepper to taste, and gently simmer until sauce is flavorful and slightly thickened, 12- 15 minutes. Strain mixture through a sieve into another saucepan, pressing on and discarding solids. Add more salt, pepper, or grated truffle to taste.
- Use hot for pasta, in potato gratins, or continue to reduce for pizza or meat.
Notes
Nutritional information is only an estimate. The accuracy of the nutritional information for any recipe on this site is not guaranteed.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: ¼ cup cream sauce
- Calories: 310
- Sugar: 3g
- Sodium: 184mg
- Fat: 19g
- Saturated Fat: 19g
- Unsaturated Fat: 9g
- Trans Fat: 1.1g
- Carbohydrates: 4.3g
- Fiber: 0.3g
- Protein: 2.4g
- Cholesterol: 93mg
Recipe originally posted October 7, 2022. Updated July 28, 2025.
janet says
hi - wondering if you have a source for the black truffles? thanks!
Indi Hampton says
Hi Janet! I've had great experiences purchasing fresh truffles from Urbani Truffles (https://shop.urbani.com/) and D'Artagnan (https://www.dartagnan.com/). My best advice would be to plan on using them within a day of receiving them, for the max flavor!