In 2014, one of the food blogs I follow, Serious Eats, put everything in a waffle iron. I am not exaggerating. They’ve waffled countless sandwiches, stuffing mixtures, desserts, pizza, even tofu. I want to say they even waffled some noodles, but I’m not sure I’m remembering that correctly. I’ve never really thought about using my waffle iron for anything other than plain old waffles. I have a waffle iron with removable plates- one side is waffle, the other side is plain for making grilled cheese or lying flat for pancakes. You know, I tried making grilled cheese once with the flat plates, and they did not cook evenly at all. But I never tried doing anything different with the waffle side of the plates.
Until the other day. I was thinking about Zander and how I could get him to eat more chili than he usually does. He’s just not a soup/chili/stew eater, and I’ve been trying to correct that. He’ll eat some, but he always eats more when I have a nice loaf of bread for him to dunk in it. So I was thinking about the chili verde I was going to make, and somehow my initial plan to make a pan of cornbread turned into wondering if I could take that same cornbread recipe and make it on my waffle iron. I thought about thick waffle batter, and thought my cornbread batter isn’t all that different. I couldn’t think of why it wouldn’t work.
I made one small change to my cornbread recipe, and that was that I used a little more oil than called for. The original recipe calls for 1/4 cup of vegetable oil or melted shortening. I was using palm shortening that I melted, and I decided to use 1/3 cup to make sure the waffles didn’t stick to the iron. I also changed how I actually made the waffles. My waffle iron makes one large sheet of four smaller waffles. It’s probably 12 inches square, but makes small, 6 inch waffles that are all connected. Normally, I just pile the batter in the middle and then end up with large, roundish waffles. This time, I took the time to put small dollops of batter on each individual square. So in the end I had four small round waffles each time I opened the iron.
They turned out great! It was interesting, because they lost that crumbly cornbread texture, but still had the cornbread flavor. They turned out slightly crisp and firm, yet tender on the inside. They were the perfect scooping tool. Zander ate significantly more chili than he normally would, simply because he could scoop it up and eat it with the waffle. It was a huge success. While we used the waffles as a scoop, they could also be used as a base, pouring the chili over the top and then using a fork and knife to eat them. When we were finished with dinner, we had a few waffles left, and Zander and I enjoyed them smeared with homemade apple butter- wow, if that wasn’t spectacular!
I haven’t put my waffle iron away yet because I’ve been thinking on what else I could put in the waffle iron. At the moment I have my thoughts centered around a few recipes for cake doughnuts… Doughnut flavor without the fry or the fancy doughnut pan? Might be worth a try…
Cornbread Waffles
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup yellow cornmeal
2 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup milk
2 eggs
1/3 cup vegetable oil or melted shortening (I used melted palm shortening)
Combine the flour, cornmeal, sugar, baking powder and salt in a mixing bowl. Whisk together until well combined.
In a separate mixing bowl, beat the eggs lightly, then add the milk and vegetable oil.
Pour the liquid ingredients into the dry ingredients and mix together only until just combined.
Spoon the batter into your waffle iron, following the directions for your specific iron.
I follow Serious Eats, too, and that onion burger recipe is the best! These waffles look and sound delicious for a change of pace. I have seen hash brown waffles that look nice and crispy too. Thanks for sharing.
Hash brown waffles! That’s one of the few ways my son will eat potatoes. I’m going to have to try that, thanks for mentioning it!