Meatless M0nday – unless if when you hear waffles, chicken isn’t far behind.

Chicken and waffles is not meatless, but a great supper any day of the week
In keeping with my resolution to reduce food waste, I had to come up with a way to use the buttermilk left over from the Irish bread baking of last week.
I once tried to cross reference my various recipes for just this sort of occasion…it was a hopeless muddle. I just wanted to group all the 1 cup of buttermilk recipes, all the 2 tablespoons of tomato paste recipes, all the…you get the picture.
But because I was reading Marion Cunningham, she neatly solved this buttermilk conundrum for me.
A waffle iron was one of the best small appliances I ever indulged myself in. I’ve actually worn out several. I don’t buy the high-end semi-industrial machine.

This waffle iron is a beaut – but at 200 bucks…I won’t eat 200 dollars worth of waffles in my lifetime!
I wait for a sale at Benny’s or Target, and get a perfectly respectable machine for under $30. It has always served well for years. Now that I make waffles less often (read: New Years Day and maybe once or twice in the year, as opposed to maybe 25 or 30 times a year) my current waffle iron should last for decades.
Waffles also have an historic element – you knew I’d be working the food history angle in here eventually –
Waffles as good time food c. early 17th century:

This is a detail from a Pieter Bruegel painting about Carnevale. Notice the waffles as gambling booty and headgear!

This is a 17th century waffle iron from France – It had to be heated over the fire. It’s hard to tell from this photo, this might be a wafer iron, which are waffles super thin, extra rich cousins.
CORNMEAL WAFFLES
1 cup cornmeal
1 ¾ cups AP flour
2 ½ teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
3 eggs, separated
2 ½ cups buttermilk
4 tablespoons of butter, melted
3 tablespoons of sugar
- Start heating the waffle iron.
- Whisk together the cornmeal, flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt until well blended.
- In a separate bowl, beat together the egg yolks. Add the buttermilk and butter to the egg yolks, blending well.
- Combine the liquid mixture with the flour mixture, mixing well.
- Beat the egg whites in a separate bowl until stiff, slowly adding the sugar.
- Fold in the beaten egg whites.
- Spoon ½ cup waffle batter in the hot greased waffle iron.
- Bake until golden. It will smell like popcorn.
- Enjoy!
Makes 6-8 waffles, depending on the size of your iron.
The Fannie Farmer Cookbook. Twelfth edition. Edited by Marion Cunningham with Jeri Laber. Alfred A. Knopf: New York. 1979.p. 500.

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