Yeast Waffles: Three Ways

Recipe at a glance:

For plain waffles:
2 cups milk (any fat content)
8 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
2 cups (or 10 oz) unbleached, all-purpose flour
1 tbs granulated sugar
1 tsp salt
2 tsp active dry or instant yeast
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tbs cornmeal (optional)

For Banana-nut Waffles, add:
3 large, ripe bananas
1 cup walnuts

For Spiked Waffles, add:
4 tbs Baileys (or other sweet alcohol of choice)

Prep time: 15 min
Cook time: 15-30 min (depends on type of waffle iron using)
Wait time: 12-24 hours to allow yeast to do its thing (or a 3 hour rise can be used if rushed)
Utensil/bowl use: Minimal – mixing bowl, whisk, waffle iron, measuring spoons/cups, small saucepan

Posted here is a basic yeasted waffle recipe with two variations, Banana-nut and Spiked Waffles. The plain yeasted waffle recipe is incredibly good and somewhat reminiscent of what Eggo waffles should be. In fact, this recipe is my favorite waffle recipe and considering that we’re a household of waffle fiends, that says alot. We happen to even have 2 waffle cookbooks (out of 6 total cookbooks in the house) and have tried out quite a few of the recipes within their pages. However, it is rare that we stray too far from this basic and simple recipe.

About once a month, our group of friends that live in the Lincoln Square (the Linc) neighborhood of Chicago, get together on Sunday mornings for brunch in someone’s apartment. We lack the seating necessary for 10+ people in our home and should have no business inviting people over to eat, but we do anyways. We jump on any chance to show off our waffles. They are so much fun to make and are also an extremely cheap way to feed a ton of people (or just yourself over the course of several days). Unfortunately for this blog, as soon as the waffles came off the iron, they were gone. I had difficultly snagging a picture of the finished product before they were snatched out of my hands and gobbled up. We made three batches of yeasted waffles that morning, one plain, one with bananas and walnuts added, and a third batch spiked with Baileys.

The players:

Most importantly, make sure your yeast is fresh. I tend to just buy the packets because this recipe requires 2 tsp of yeast and each packet has about 2 and 1/4 tsp.

Chop up a stick of butter into smallish pieces and put into a small sauce pot.

Add two cups of milk to the butter and heat on low to melt the butter.

Stir occasionally to make sure the milk doesn’t boil. Melting of the butter should take less than five minutes. Remove the saucepan from heat and set aside for a few minutes to allow the milk mixture to cool until it is warm to the touch.

Add two cups of all purpose flour to a medium mixing bowl.

Add a tablespoon of sugar

and a teaspoon of salt.

Add two teaspoons of yeast to the dry ingredients

Whisk the dry ingredients together.

Once the melted butter/milk mixture is warm to the touch, add it to the dry ingredients in 2-3 batches.

Whisk the wet and dry ingredients together in between additions of the butter and milk mixture

The mixture will be very milky and you want it not have many flour chunks.

Crack two eggs into a small bowl.

Add a teaspoon of vanilla to the eggs.

Beat eggs and vanilla together until well mixed.

Pour egg mixture into batter.

Gently whisk egg mixture and batter to incorporate.

Cover batter with foil (or plastic wrap) and place bowl in the fridge. The batter needs 12-24 hours in order to properly develop the yeast. We usually make the batter on Saturday afternoon for a Sunday brunch. If you happen to not have enough time for the batter to rise in the fridge, you can cut the rise time down by allowing the batter to rise on the countertop. You can cut the rise time down to about 3-4 hours using this warm rise method. However, the longer rise time allows for the yeasty flavor to really develop and I would highly recommend using a cold rise over the warm rise.

If you want to make plain waffles, skip the steps that include the bananas, walnuts, or Baileys.

For Banana-Nut waffles:

Ideally, your 3-4 large bananas will be riper than this. You want to be able to mash them easily.

Peel bananas into a small bowl and mash them with a fork. Since these bananas weren’t overripe, the mashing was a bit difficult. You can see that Chris was tasked with this job.

Here’s what three mashed bananas look like. I thought you should know. Lovely, right?

Get a cup of walnuts or any other nut that tickles your fancy.

Coarsely chop the nuts.

Check out these nuts!

Add bananas and nuts to batter and whisk to incorporate.

To make Spiked Waffles, grab your favorite liqueur. I chose Baileys because that is what I had on hand but I think that Kahlua or Cointreau would work just as well.

Add 4 tbs of liqueur to the waffle batter and whisk to incorporate.

To make your waffles, first preheat your waffle iron.

Once toppings are prepared (if using), it is time to reveal the batter. Peel away the foil to reveal…

…the most bubbly of batters!

Add 1 tbs of cornmeal to the batter. This step is optional but I find that its addition crisps up the outer crust of the waffle while leaving a soft and moist texture on the inside.

Whisk batter to deflate and mix in the cornmeal. The batter will have doubled in size.

Cook the waffles according to your waffle iron’s instructions. Here is my giant waffle iron after several rounds of waffles. We’re such a mess.

The banana-nut waffles are ready to come off the iron. We still have yet to develop the proper technique for pouring waffle batter to make 6 perfect waffle squares. We have yet to do exhaustive research into this phenomenon either. I don’t mind. I like to sneak bites the partial corners right off the iron before they make it to the plate.

Mmmm! My plate of finished waffles!

Another bonus to this recipe is that these waffles freeze extremely well. We freeze any leftovers in individual serving sandwich bags. After a few minutes in the toaster, they are as good as fresh and way better than anything you can buy premade in the freezer section.

Yeast Waffles (inspired by Cooks Illustrated)

For plain waffles:
2 cups milk (any fat content)
8 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
2 cups (or 10 oz) unbleached, all-purpose flour
1 tbs granulated sugar
1 tsp salt
2 tsp active dry or instant yeast
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tbs cornmeal (optional)

For Banana-nut Waffles, add:
3 large, ripe bananas
1 cup walnuts

For Spiked Waffles, add:
4 tbs Baileys (or other liqueur of choice)

Cut up butter into small pieces and place into a small saucepan. Heat milk and butter on low to medium low until the butter is just melted, stirring often. Once the butter is melted, remove the saucepan from heat and cool the butter and milk mixture until it is warm to the touch. While the mixture is cooling, combine flour, sugar, salt and yeast in a medium mixing bowl. Whisk the butter and milk mixture into the dry ingredients mixture in several batches. Continue whisking until the mixture is smooth. In a separate bowl, beat eggs and vanilla until combined. Add egg mixture to batter and whisk until combined. Cover the bowl of batter with plastic wrap or foil and refrigerate for 12 to 24 hours. (Alternatively, if you are short on time, you can make this batter three hours in advance and allow it to rise on the countertop. However, the yeast flavor is richer with the cooler rise in the fridge)

After the batter has had time to rise, prepare and heat your waffle iron according to manufacturer’s instructions. Prepare any additional ingredients for Banana-nut or Spiked waffles. Removed the batter from the fridge and whisk batter to deflate. Add extra ingredients (mashed bananas and chopped nuts or Baileys, if using). Whisk in cornmeal, if using. Bake waffles according to your waffle iron’s instructions. (We use about 1 cup of batter for our large waffle iron. Round waffle irons will use about 1/2 cup of batter.)

Serve waffles immediately or keep in a warm oven on a wire rack until ready to serve. Any leftover waffles can be frozen in plastic wrap or in a plastic zippered storage bag and reheated in a toaster when ready to eat.