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Old Virginia Waffles
Mix 1 quart of milk with ¾ of a cupful of flour and ¼ of a cupful of corn-meal. Add 1 teaspoonful of salt, 1 tablespoonful of melted butter, and 3 eggs, beaten until very light. Bake immediately in well-greased waffle irons.
A plain egg-raised waffle batter with a little cornmeal for crispness. The proportions as printed will not hold together, so read the ratio note first.
- The flour is shortOne quart of milk against three-quarters of a cup of flour and a quarter cup of cornmeal gives a batter no thicker than milk itself, which will run straight out of the iron. A workable waffle batter of this style runs roughly equal volumes of liquid and flour: for 1 quart of milk expect somewhere near 3 to 4 cups of flour plus the quarter cup of cornmeal. Mix to the consistency of heavy cream and adjust before you commit the whole batch.
- No leavening at allLift comes only from the three eggs beaten "until very light." Separate them, beat the whites to soft peaks, and fold them in last for a waffle with any loft. Alternatively add 2 teaspoons baking powder with the dry ingredients.
- "Bake immediately"This is the hinge. Air beaten into the eggs is the only raising agent, and it collapses within minutes. Have the irons hot and greased before the eggs go in.
- Waffle ironsMost likely cast-iron plates heated over coals or a stove eye and turned by hand. A modern electric iron works; set it to medium-high and expect the first waffle to be a test. Cast iron needs greasing between waffles, an electric non-stick plate usually does not.
- CornmealUse fine or medium yellow cornmeal, not coarse polenta grind, and not self-rising cornmeal mix. It contributes grit and crispness rather than structure.
- YieldA quart of milk with the flour corrected makes a large batch, roughly 10 to 12 standard waffles. Halve it for two or three people, since the batter does not keep once the whites are folded in.
Cornmeal in a wheat-flour waffle is often said to be a Southern habit rather than a Northern one, and cookbooks reaching for regional flavor routinely tagged such batters "Old Virginia" or "Virginia" well into the twentieth century, whether or not any particular Virginia household stood behind them. Waffle irons were long-handled cast-iron tongs held over coals or a stove eye and turned once, which is why so many old recipes insist on greasing and on baking at once. The ingredients themselves are plain enough: milk, eggs, a little butter, and cornmeal stretching the more expensive wheat flour, with no chemical leavening bought from a tin.