Music and Cats

One advantage to having a quiet New Year’s Eve at home, sans overindulgence in mind-altering substances of any sort, is that one feels well enough to overindulge in breakfast on New Year’s Day. (If just a glance at the above photo induces queasiness, I would suggest that you read no farther… but please come back when your hangover has dissipated.)

While waffles are not my favorite breakfast food ever (that place of honor is held by french toast), they are near the top of my list for holiday breakfasts. I tend to reserve the baking of waffles for holidays or weekends because they are fairly time-consuming to prepare, and richer than I want to know I should eat regularly.

I tend not to think about waffles until the morning on which I make them, at which point I make a recipe leavened with a combination of baking powder and buttermilk. However, while eating dinner with Paul last night, I thought about making waffles for this morning’s breakfast. This meant that I had time to prepare waffles the old-fashioned way, leavened with yeast, and allowed to rise overnight. A new recipe for the new year.

Yeasted Buckwheat Waffles
from Deborah Madison’s Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone by way of epicurious.com (Deleted text indicates my adaptations of the recipe.)

1 package active dry yeast
1 teaspoon sugar
2 cups lukewarm milk
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup buckwheat flour
2 1 tablespoons sugar
5 tablespoons canola oil or butter, melted
2 eggs, beaten
1/2 teaspoon baking soda

In a small bowl, sprinkle the yeast onto 1/4 cup warm water and stir in the sugar. Let stand until foamy, about 10 minutes. In a large bowl, combine the warm milk and salt and the yeast mixture. Whisk in the flours.

Cover the bowl, and leave on the counter overnight. If the weather (or your house) is warm, refrigerate the batter instead. You want a slow overnight rise, not a yeasty explosion. In the morning, you should have something that looks bubbly and noticably larger. If you tilt the bowl, you’ll see some strands of gluten, though nothing like no-knead bread dough after an 18-hour rise.

In another small bowl, beat together the eggs, melted butter, sugar and baking soda. Pour onto the flour mixture, and fold in until combined. You’ll lose some volume, but don’t worry. As soon as the yeast gets a taste of the additional sugar, it will start making more CO₂, and the batter will begin rising again. My batter, sitting on my range under the warming light, went a little crazy. After I baked each of the first two waffles, it seemed that the level of batter in the bowl had not gone down! It just kept rising! Halfway through the baking process, when the batter seemed a bit too full of air pockets, I stirred it down a little, and eventually was able to empty the bowl.

Per the recipe, you should cook these “according to your waffle iron’s instructions.” I no longer have our round waffle iron’s instructions, but I know to heat the iron until the red light goes off, pour in a little over half a cup of batter, and cook until the red light goes off again… and then a couple minutes more, because I like my waffles crispy on the edges. Your waffle iron’s mileage may vary. According to the recipe, you’ll get 10 to 12 waffles. Where waffles are concerned, I don’t know what this quantity means. Does this mean 10-12 round Belfgian waffles, or 10-12 thin square waffles, or what? I can tell you that this recipe made 8 waffles on our thin, round waffle iron. Had I not stirred the batter into submission after the first four, perhaps it would have made 9 or 10 lighter, airier waffles. If you’re baking these waffles for a crowd, or even just for yourself and your sweetheart, keep the cooked waffles in a 200 degree oven until ready to serve. While you’re at it, warm your plates in the oven, too.

These waffles are lovely: light (yeast), crispy (butter) and earthy (buckwheat). While I am usually a fan of preserves as a topping for waffles (and pancakes and french toast), these are particularly good with maple syrup, which complements the buckwheat flavor. Warm the maple syrup, too, before serving, especially if you store it in your refrigerator.

Warm waffles and warm syrup on warm plates. Is it possible to improve on that delicious combination? Only one way: share them with people who warm your heart.

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