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Dessert

Crisp Waffles

A batter of egg, buttermilk, flour, cornmeal, lard, and baking soda is whisked and baked into crisp waffles.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Buttermilk and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,721 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Crisp Waffles

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Beat the egg well in a bowl.

  2. Add half of the buttermilk and stir.

  3. Gradually mix in the flour.

  4. Add the remaining buttermilk, then the cornmeal and melted lard.

  5. Just before baking, stir in the baking soda.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Buttermilk + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,721 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Egg + buttermilktop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,986 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Egg
Binds the batter and gives it structure as it sets during cooking.
Buttermilk
Adds moisture and acidity, and its acid reacts with the baking soda.
Flour
Provides the main structure that holds the waffle together.
Cornmeal
Adds a gritty texture that helps the waffle stay crisp.
Lard
Adds fat that promotes browning and a crisp, tender crust.
Baking soda
Reacts with the buttermilk's acid to release gas, giving the waffles lift.

The step that matters

Stir in the baking soda just before baking. Baking soda reacts with the acid in buttermilk and starts releasing gas right away. If it sits too long in the batter, that gas escapes and the waffles lose lift, so it should go in just before the batter hits the iron.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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