Let them eat waffles like the Belgians do…

I adore waffles…

Waffles, in any guise have a place in my heart for the simple fact that they are one of human kind’s best inventions, and they connect me to my culture, to my home. Waffles are great things because of their characteristics; they have little cups made by the imprint of a waffle iron - shallow or deep, depending on the sort of waffle - to keep hold of a topping or filling. But not all waffles have a topping or filling, which means the waffle imprint has another function too and that is in its waffle essence to evenly cook the dough in a time before ovens. 

Mouthfeel is another thing; the experience of eating a thin, crisp, buttery Luk waffle with a tiny shallow waffle imprint is entirely different from eating a thick oval-shaped Liège waffle made from yeast dough and featuring a large deep imprint. The latter, although a perfect waffle to add toppings to because of its deep imprint, is however not traditionally eaten with a topping…. Still, if you look around tourist hot spots in Belgium (and the US, too) you will see it offered with a topping of cream, chocolate sauce, fruit and other things they can throw at it. I can not stand the sight of it because this isn’t how you should eat this waffle, and I am not saying this because I am a waffle purist. The Liège waffle is indeed a street food, but the topping/filling is baked into the waffle in the form of sugar nibs (pearls sugar); baking it twice makes for a waffle with sticky bits and sugary bits which are glorious to discover and completely ruined by any topping. So if you ever visit Belgium and buy a waffle from a waffle or ice-cream counter, refrain from having a topping and discover this heavy, yeasty waffle in its simple sugary glory. You will quickly think of me and realise that the waffle is so filling that a topping would have made it too much of a good thing, and hopefully, you will agree that in this waffle’s case, simple is best

Liège waffle, on the left in Ghent suggested with Nutella, on the right just perfect as it is without any topping.

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The Brussels waffle is the only traditional Belgian waffle that benefits from a topping. It is neatly rectangular and is almost a caricature of itself; that is how perfect it always looks. It looks identical to the prop waffles they make to display in touristy places. This is because while this waffle uses the same waffle iron shape as the Liège waffle before, they are not made from a chunk of dough but from a lighter batter that runs neatly into every nook and cranny of the waffle iron - resulting in this perfect shape. This batter contains no sugar or such a tiny amount it can be ignored. The sweetness in this case, comes from dusting the waffle in a very generous layer of icing sugar. Then follows a choice of two traditional toppings, soft farmhouse butter melting into the waffle - which is a centuries-old custom, or thick whipped cream, which is historically more recent. Strawberries sometimes feature, we grow a lot of strawberries in Belgium after all, but anything else really is blasphemous, especially when eating this waffle in the street. This waffle is a festive waffle that should be eaten on a plate in a tea room. You need it to be freshly baked, which isn’t often the case when you buy them in the street, and it cools off too quickly outside, resulting in a cold dry waffle. 

Brussels waffles, eat them on a plate, cutting off row by row, square by square…

 

If you’ve ever been caught in the tourist trap of ordering one of these in the streets of Bruges, you will remember that afterwards, your clothes were covered in icing sugar. The clue is in the sugar, it needs a ridiculous amount of icing sugar as this is traditional, but when you stand against the wind, or you are a bit clumsy (or a child)… you will be covered in sugar like you’ve been caught in a light snowstorm. This shows that this is not how you should eat this waffle, and I’m not being pedantic, but I want you to have the best possible waffle experience. You need to be able to cut off each row and each square of the waffle and witness its wonderful crisp edible paper-like exterior and the millimetre of soft dough in the middle. If you bite into it in the street you will destroy the mouthfeel and experience that is so characteristic of this waffle. You wouldn’t eat a crisp biscuit-like Luk waffle with a knife and fork on a plate; that is daft, so why would you bite into a waffle topped with sugar, cream and a mountain of strawberries or another topping and get it all over your coat, shoes or the floor.

Waffles for weddings

It used to be the tradition in Belgium to go to a tearoom to eat this waffle with the family around the New year; another tradition is when Belgians travelled to the coast, as this was considered a special occasion, the Brussels waffle was never far away. This is indeed a special occasion waffle. My husband and I went to our local tearoom straight after our legal wedding at city hall (our actual wedding was in a quaint English village) to have a Brussels waffle and mark the occasion. That is the importance of a waffle to a Belgian.

Waffles for weddings is a centuries-old tradition that even Belgians have forgotten about. I found out because I discovered wedding waffle irons with instead of a waffle imprint the names and date of the wedding party.

In Dark Rye and Honey Cake (Van wafel tot koek)

, my new book (you can read all about it in two previous substacks I wrote) I have 14 waffle recipes. This doesn’t mean there aren’t more waffle recipes because there are, I just had to make choices because paper was dear during the pandemic when this book was printed and upping our page count therefore impossible as our paper was ordered 2 years(!!!!) in advance to avoid a delay. But still, even Belgians are impressed with 14 waffle recipes.

In my book I tell the story of the concept of the “Belgian waffle” and how that idea went around the world. How did the waffle end up in America? And do American tourists have anything to do with the demand for elaborate toppings and eating the waffle in the street

For Belgian beer we have a glass for each beer, and for waffles, we also have different waffle iron plate for different waffles. You can not of course bake snappy, biscuit-like Luk waffles in a waffle iron with a deep imprint, you need a shallow print. And when it comes to shallow waffle prints, those can have large or small squares. While the Luk waffle has small squares, the Lacqueman has large ones to keep hold of the syrup running out of it. It is not uncommon for Belgian households to have a waffle iron, or even more than one, or one with interchangeable waffle plates so that the different style waffles can be made. 

Lacquement waffle, a waffle eaten on the fair or “kermis” in Antwerp and Liège.

Brittle Lukken waffles, made for the New year in the West of Flanders

Stroopwafels, while eaten at home in Flanders, in the Netherlands they are also eaten in the street

Regula’s Waffles

One recipe has become the most-baked, and I didn’t see that coming. Regula’s waffles, because that is how I labelled them when I would gift them to my family as a child. The recipe is for a waffle that keeps for a long while; we call it “bewaarwafels” or waffles to keep, or pantry waffles, there just isn’t a simple translation for it. Everyone in Belgium knows this waffle because this is the waffle that is baked the most in the home. The aforementioned waffles are rarely made in the home, unless if you have a keen baker in the house who wants to bake them, no one bothers because the waffle has a time and a place and for the Liège waffle that is to warm your hands on in the street when days become colder and for the Brussels waffle that is… in a tearoom.

My Regula’s waffle recipe originally came from the one cookbook we had at home growing up. I was born in 1983 and in that time, you would not be greeted by cookbooks in every bookstore and at the check-out till in the supermarket. So I genuinely thought our cookbook was “the cookbook” as in the only cookbook. The book featured one waffle recipe, for these pantry waffles. So I’d bake them and make boxes, label them with hand-painted labels and give them away. I loved how the trays of waffles would take over the tiny kitchen and living room of our small city flat and how the whole block of flats would smell like waffles. As a child I didn’t think I could half the recipe; that is something I tried in my teens.

Over the years, I’ve changed the method or tried less sugar because I always assumed that - especially because the recipe was not detailed - you were supposed to figure things out and make the recipe your own, which is what I did. Recipes were merely a guide to me then, a stark contrast to the demand of publishers - and public - these days for recipes to be a step-by-step guide which leaves no room for error, but also no room to experiment and indeed room to get better at cooking or baking by gaining self-confidence. 

When I had to actually write the recipe down, I had to have a think… in my old notebook, I just have the ingredients and no method. I like this, all my childhood recipes are very short or don’t even contain much of a method. And if I am honest long recipes today make me anxious because - now I know, being recently diagnosed after a lengthly process of tests that went on for 6 months - I have ADHD and dyslexia, meaning I can’t keep my focus for long and I also tend to lose my thread while I am following a recipe as dyslexia moves words and paragraphs around. Ha! Great fun!

Anyway, back to waffles. Here is the recipe of my childhood waffles. There is a small error in the method of this recipe in the book which has been corrected below. But to be honest, because whipping the egg whites gives such a small difference, I went back to my childhood method of just chucking everything together… Just try it out and make this recipe your own.

Regula’s Waffles, the recipe

Makes about 14 large waffles and many more small ones

• 125 g (41/2 oz) unsalted butter

• 250 ml (9 fl oz) full-fat milk

• 5 (+- 50 gram) eggs, separated

• 280 g (10 oz) caster (superfine) sugar

• 2 teaspoons natural vanilla essence, or seeds of 1 vanilla pod

• 490 g (1 lb 2 oz) plain wheat, rye or spelt flour

• 1 tablespoon baking powder

• pinch (1/8 teaspoon) salt

• oil, for greasing

Use a plain waffle iron.

In a small saucepan, melt the butter in the milk and let the mixture cool.

Meanwhile, whisk the egg yolks with the sugar and vanilla until the mixture is light and creamy. (or leave the eggs whole and omit the step whisking the egg whites)

In a large bowl, combine the flour, baking powder and salt, pour in

the milk mixture and stir with a wooden spoon, now work in the egg yolk mixture, stirring until well combined.

Whip the egg whites to stiff peaks and fold them into the batter.

Heat a waffle iron until the light switches off, indicating that it is ready. 

Have a bowl of oil and a brush ready to grease the iron between bakes if the iron is not non-stick. Use 1 or 2 tablespoons of batter and see if you like the size. Bake the waffles to a golden brown colour and transfer to a wire rack. How long this takes depends on your iron, so please test the cooking time with the first waffle.

Eat them warm, but they are equally very good cold. Reheating cold waffles in a hot waffle iron revives them beautifully and gives them a little crisp exterior. Keep leftover waffles in an airtight container for up to 1 week (2 weeks is fine too) as they only get better; they also freeze very well.

You prefer savoury? I got you covered, below are savoury sweet potato and cheese waffles from Dark Rye and Honey Cake (Van wafel tot koek), they are just the best breakfast and brunch waffle. I love eating them with Fromage blanc or “Plattekaas” which is a fresh cheese like thick quark. Hope you’ll give my book a go!

Upcoming events and talks:

• Friday, April 14, 2023 - CUCINA POVERA: The Art of Making Do With What You’ve Got - Online event with MoFad New York and Kitchen Arts and Letters. A conversation with Giulia Scarpaleggia and Regula Ysewijn. Purchase tickets here.

  
  American Book tour dates (keep an eye on the website for changes and additional dates)

• San Francisco

  Omnivore Books

  Thursday 18 May

  6:30 PM

  Author talk. The event is free but you do need to book to secure your place as spaces are limited. Book here >

  Location: 3885A Cesar Chavez St. San Francisco, CA 94131

• Seattle

  Book Larder
  Saturday 20 May

  10:oo – 11:30 AM

  Author talk. Moderator: Rachael Coyle, owner of Coyle’s Bakeshop, Seattle
  Entry $5 or free when you purchase the book (you can choose on the event page)
  spaces are limited so be sure to book your spot here >

  Location: 4252 Fremont Ave N Seattle, Washington 98103

• Los Angeles

  Now Serving

  Thursday 25 May

  7:00 PM

  Author talk. Regula will be interviewed by Nik Sharma, a molecular biologist turned two-time James Beard finalist and best-selling cookbook author of The Flavour Equation and Season.  

  Location: 727 N. Broadway Unit 133 Los Angeles, CA 90012 (213) 395-0627

Until Next time! What is your favourite waffle? Are you Belgian? What waffles do you make at home? Do post any questions or whatever below, I love the interaction!