Soda Waffles
1 pint of flour. 1 pint of milk. 1 teaspoonful of soda, dissolved in the milk. 2 teaspoonfuls of cream of tartar, mixed in the flour. 2 eggs. 1 tablespoonful of butter. Beat up and bake quickly.
Another Recipe for Waffles. 1 quart of flour, with a kitchen-spoonful of corn meal added 3 eggs beaten separately. 1 quart of milk. 1 teacup of water. 1 teaspoonful of salt. Lump of butter large as a walnut, melted and poured in. Bake in hot irons. One secret of having good waffles is to have the batter thin.--Miss R. S.
Two waffle batters, both leavened for speed rather than raised with yeast. The first is a chemical-leavened batter that must go into the iron the moment it is mixed; the second is an egg-raised batter whose whole virtue is thinness.
- Mix and bake at onceSoda dissolved in milk and cream of tartar sifted into flour make a single-acting leavening: the gas is released as soon as wet meets dry, and it does not come back. Have the iron hot and the fat ready before the two bowls meet.
- Soda and cream of tartar in modern termsOne teaspoon of soda with two of cream of tartar is roughly the equivalent of four teaspoons of commercial baking powder. If you substitute, use double-acting powder and the batter will forgive a few minutes' standing.
- A pint of flourA pint here is a measure of volume, not weight: about 2 cups, or 8 to 9 ounces of all-purpose flour scooped and levelled. A pint of milk is 2 cups, so the batter is loose, closer to a thick crepe batter than a modern waffle mix.
- SaltThe first recipe omits it entirely. Half a teaspoon brings it into line with the second, which calls for a full teaspoon to a quart of flour.
- Kitchen-spoonful, teacup, walnutA kitchen-spoonful of corn meal is usually reckoned at about a tablespoon or a little more. A teacup of the period is generally taken as about three-quarters of a cup, though the measure varied from kitchen to kitchen. Butter "large as a walnut" is conventionally reckoned at roughly an ounce, or 1 to 2 tablespoons.
- Eggs beaten separatelyIn the second recipe this means yolks into the batter, whites whipped and folded in last. It is the lift in that batter, so fold rather than stir and cook immediately.
- "Bake quickly" and "hot irons"Period waffle irons were hinged cast-iron plates, some long-handled for use over coals, others made to sit in a hoop over a stove opening, and in either case turned partway through. An electric iron on medium-high does the same work; preheat fully and brush the plates with butter or oil for the first waffle or two.
- Thin batterMiss R. S. is right and it is the point of both recipes. A thin batter spreads into the grids and steams itself crisp; a thick one produces something closer to cake. Add milk by the spoonful if the batter mounds on the spoon.
- Yield and servingThe first recipe should give something like six waffles in a standard round iron; the second, built on twice the flour, roughly twice that. Neither batter contains sugar.
Housekeeping in Old Virginia, compiled by Marion Cabell Tyree and published in 1879, is a collection of contributed recipes, which is why so many entries close with a set of initials rather than an author's name. Waffles held a settled place in Virginia tea and supper tables, cooked in hinged iron plates on long handles that were, at least traditionally, held or propped over the coals and flipped halfway through, well before the electric iron existed. The soda-and-cream-of-tartar pairing in the first recipe is a household version of baking powder: cooks had been combining the two themselves for decades, and packaged powders were on the market by this date. The second recipe, leaning on beaten whites and a spoonful of corn meal, is the older method, and the two sitting side by side on one page show a kitchen in the middle of changing over.