I’ve seen people rave about chaffles for a year or more now. I was intrigued, and given how well the “eggs and cheese” in Fathead dough works to imitate a very bread-y tasting product, I wanted to give them a bash – if only to see what all the fuss was about!
First attempts
Before I caved and bought a waffle maker this summer, I tried to make them in a pan in an egg ring. I ended up with a cheese omelette! I also tried a sweet attempt in the pan, and the “sweet cheese” taste was so weird it ended up in the food bin.
For my experiments, I found a “basic recipe” somewhere on the internet: For 2 chaffles, 1 cup grated mozzarella, 2 eggs, 1 tbsp butter, and 2 tbsp ground almond. (Note: I can’t eat nuts, and I’ve also personally chosen to be Carnivore right now, so I subbed in crushed pork crunch for the almond.)
That recipe with the waffle maker made something that had the right structure and form. And although it had cheesy notes, it wasn’t overly cheesy in taste. So I deemed it “OK” as a base for savoury things. Definitely good as the base for a quick meal if I wanted a change in texture from omelette.
So, I could see people’s point yet… it was not anything that I’d consider as really “waffle-like” at all. Certainly not something that I wanted to attempt to make sweet ever again. (Thinking on it as I write, that would also be because I used salted butter, which would have emphasised the cheese notes…)
The chaffles this recipe makes are quite dense, squishy and greasy. They also “sat heavy” in my tummy, so I didn’t really want to bother with them that much.
Why am I writing about chaffles now?
Yesterday evening, when I was looking up the recipe to remind myself of the proportions to cook myself a low fuss dinner, I found a different “basic” recipe. This one has a slightly different technique to previous and only two ingredients – egg and very finely grated mozzarella. They also suggested that if you wanted some texture to add a much smaller amount of ground nuts, so I again subbed in some crushed pork crunch.
By leaving out the butter and not having nearly as much “flour”, along with other method differences I’ll talk about below, the difference in the end product is like night and day.
These are light, fluffy, dry and very waffle-like. They are not at all cheesy, you could even say they are bland in taste.
Which given a waffle is usually a vehicle for topping of some description, is exactly what you want.
With this recipe, the chaffle experience is so much more pleasant and also versatile.
I can totally see why this batter could be made sweet or chocolate with no issues, or eaten with a sugar-free syrup as is.
So, I thought that I would share my discovery with you!
Chaffles – notes on methodology
The key to the success of this recipe is I believe down to having two bits of kitchen kit – a fine micro plane and a balloon whisk – the batter needs to be light and airy and having well beaten eggs and very finely grated cheese achieves this.
Neither of these notes are in any of the other recipes for chaffles I found.
I think part of my previous “less than success” attempts were not great because I used bagged grated mozzarella with the potato starch left on. (That, and the salted butter…)
So, you are going to need a block of “pizza mozzarella” to grate finely. Pizza mozzarella is stocked in some supermarkets, but it’s far more usual to see the wet balls or pre-grated.
You cannot use the ball mozzarella as it is simply way too wet. And I now know that the size of the pre-grated mozzarella isn’t optimal for this recipe. I suspect pre-grated would work if you chop it down with a large knife/mezzaluna if you can’t get hold of a block.
I’ve bought the catering size block linked above and have it portioned into ~230g chunks in my freezer (all cheese freezes really well), so I’m set for the year for chaffles!
Ingredients
For one chaffle
- ~35g (1/2 cup) very finely grated pizza block mozzarella
- 1 large egg
- 1tsp crushed pork crunch (very optional, totally not needed at all)
Method
- Turn on your waffle iron to heat up
- Grate enough mozzarella to loosely fill your 1/2 cup, leave it fluffy in the cup.
- Crack the egg into a bowl and whisk for about 90 seconds to 2 minutes.
- so it is fully combined and has a bubbly, light appearance.
- Combine the egg, cheese and pork crunch and whisk a bit more. The batter will be loose and look lumpy and sloppy.
- Pour the batter into the fully heated iron and cook for 8 minutes.
(Mine is non stick, so no need to grease. You might need a wipe of butter or dripping on yours) - Remove and enjoy! 🙂
Suggested Savoury topping
In the post’s picture, I made a cheese sauce and chopped some ham to go on top of these.
I measured none of this as cheese sauce is something I do so often I’m happy to eyeball it.
- Put about 100ml of double cream in a frying pan with a pinch of salt.
- Turn on high and reduce for a couple of minutes.
- Turn off the heat and add a generous knob of cream cheese and a nice amount of grated cheddar.
- Stir to melt in the cheese, pour over the chaffles and top with chopped ham.
If you want a bit more guidance, go watch my full video on cheese sauce here: https://www.facebook.com/1002022859824079/videos/1824140850945605
