Heaven on a Plate: Saturday Mornings just got WAFFLES!

Take a deep breath in. Hold it. . . . . . . . . . . Now let it out. That's what Saturday mornings (or any day off mornings) are supposed to feel like. Decompress, de-stress, and delight! One of our favorite "day off" traditions before we went GF/SF (gluten free/sugar free) was making (and eating) WAFFLES!

It was a sad day when my son woke up one Saturday, scuffled out into the living room in his footy jammies, and realized that his world had changed. "Mom, does not having gluten mean we can't have waffles anymore?" he asked, eyes huge with disappointment. That was tough to face.

Before I mastered my GF flour mix, I would try to make waffles using several different variations (all based on brown rice flour) and they were awful. They either fell apart and burned in the waffle iron, or they tasted disgusting. For several months, we had to settle for lumpy, crumbly, pancakes.

However, once I got MY flour mix down, I went looking for a good waffle recipe to modify. Thanks to the wonderful folks over at http://www.glutenfreecookingschool.com/ I found what I was looking for almost right away! I used their waffle recipe as a starting point and then did some tweaking. This is what I came up with:

Gluten Free Waffles

1 3/4 cups Andria's All Purpose Gluten Free Flour Mix

1 Tbsp. baking powder (Argo Aluminum Free is my favorite)

1 Tbsp. sugar (raw/turbinado sugar, coconut sugar, etc.)

2 scoops Whey Protein Powder

1/2 tsp. salt

3 large eggs

16 Tbsp unsalted butter, melted (or olive oil...I like to use half butter, half olive oil for a good balance of flavor and "healthy") 

1 1/2 c. milk (soy, cow, rice, coconut, etc)

*optional: 2 Tbsp. Ground Flax Seed

Cooking Directions:

1. Mix first five ingredients together in large mixing bowl.

2. Beat the eggs together until frothy. Add the milk and stir again.

3. Slowly pour the melted butter into the egg/milk mixture. Stir constantly to prevent the eggs from cooking.

4. Now add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix just until all of the flour is wet. You don’t have to get all of the lumps out.

5. Pour the batter onto a hot waffle iron. Follow the waffle iron manufacturer’s directions for cooking. For ours we use 1/2 c. batter and let the waffle’s cook until there is no more steam coming out.

Additional Notes:

1. Let your eggs and milk come to room temperature. If the eggs and milk are cold, then they will resolidify the melted butter when you mix them together.

2. These waffles are not sweet, so you can add sweet or savory toppings to them. You could also 1/4 – 1/2 cup of raisins, cheese, bacon, nuts, sliced bananas, grated coconut to the batter before cooking.

Oh My Goodness! These are seriously AMAZING! We eat 'em with 100% pure maple syrup (which works great as a sugar substitute in many recipes, too) and strawberries! My husband is happy and my family has our tradition back!