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Flemish Waffles, or Gaufres
Very rich and delicate when directions are followed. This is only half the quantity of hotel waffle receipt: 1 pound of flour. 2 cups of milk. 1 cup of yeast. 1 cup of thick cream. 8 ounces of butter, melted. 12 eggs. Salt. 1 ounce or spoonful of sugar. Set a sponge over night, or else 6 hours before the meal, with the flour, milk and yeast. In the morning separate the eggs, beat the yolks light and add to the sponge, together with the sugar, butter and salt. Beat up well, let rise an hour. Then whip the cup of cream and stir in, and lastly the whites of eggs beaten to a froth.
French Sweet Waffles, or Gaufres. Made without yeast. 1 pound of flour. 6 ounces of sugar. 14 eggs. Salt. 1 pint of milk. 1 pint of cream. 1 ounce of butter, melted. 1/2 cup of brandy Separate the eggs. Mix flour, sugar and salt dry, in a pan. Beat yolks and milk together, pour them in the middle and stir to a batter, smooth and without lumps. Then add the brandy and melted butter. When about to bake whip the pint of cream to a froth and mix it io, and then beat the whites up firm and add likewise. Bake soon, while the mixture is creamy and light. When the batter must stand and wait during a long meal a little baking powder should be beaten in after the lightness of the cream and egg-whites has evaporated. This makes fine pancakes as well.
As a rule, for those who would excel, it is well to remember that white of eggs makes waffles and pancakes tough and leathery unless added in the form of froth, which carries fine air bubbles into the batter. When not so beaten the cakes will be better with the whites left out altogether and powder used instead, along with the yolks which alone give the richness. Just such fine distinctions as these well observed make the difference betwixt fine cooks and those who loaf, out of employment, on street corners.
Two related batters, both built on whipped cream and whipped egg whites rather than chemical leavening. The proportions are hotel proportions even at "half quantity," so read the yield note before you start.
- Scale and yieldA pound of flour is about 3 1/2 cups. The Flemish batter takes a pint of milk and a cup of cream with 12 eggs; the French takes a pint each of milk and cream with 14. Either way this is several quarts of batter and dozens of waffles. Quartering either recipe gives a household batch without changing the method.
- "1 cup of yeast"This means a cup of liquid yeast or barm kept going in the kitchen, not dry yeast. For the Flemish version use about 1 1/2 teaspoons of instant or active dry yeast and make up the lost liquid with roughly an extra cup of milk.
- The spongeFlour, milk and yeast set overnight, or six hours before the meal. Cover it; it will rise well and smell distinctly beery, which is correct.
- Egg whites are the hingeThe author says it outright at the end: whites folded in as a stiff froth carry air into the batter, while whites merely stirred in make the cakes leathery. Fold in thirds with a spatula, keep visible streaks of white, and bake at once.
- Whipped cream, not poured creamBoth recipes call for the cream to be whipped separately and folded in near the end. Use heavy cream whipped to soft peaks, not stiff. A cup is 8 fl oz; a pint is 16.
- Waffle ironThese were written for a hinged cast-iron iron heated on a range or over the fire and greased between each cake. On an electric iron use a medium-high setting, brush the plates once with clarified butter or oil, and expect the yeasted batter to expand more than the modern packaged kind.
- BrandyThe half cup in the French version is for flavour and tenderness; some of the alcohol cooks off, though not all. Plain brandy or cognac is what is meant, not a sweetened liqueur.
- The baking powder asideThe instruction to beat in "a little baking powder" applies only to batter that has slumped while sitting through a long service. A little means just that, stirred in just before baking, to revive it.
Gaufre is the French word for waffle, and shares a root with "wafer"; gaufre also means honeycomb, after the pattern of the irons. The recipe's own reference to a "hotel waffle receipt" shows the page was written from professional practice, which is why the two batters -- one yeasted and set overnight, one quick with egg and cream -- stand side by side in hotel quantities, with the yeast version marked as half a working batch. The closing jab at cooks who "loaf, out of employment, on street corners" fits a book addressed to people working for wages, for whom technique was the thing that kept a job.