So since my first attempt at savory waffles was a bit of a miss, I figured I’d try my second choice savory recipe that I had found. This one comes courtesy of Serious Eats, and specifically is their Bacon, Cheese, and Scallions Waffles recipe.
Spoiler alert: It seems in my savory experiments, second, really, was the best.
Everything but the Potato
On this first attempt at this recipe, I ended up preparing them for dinner rather than breakfast. Don’t judge: They’re savory waffles, and savory waffles for dinner is a perfectly acceptable choice. And as a dinner waffle? These guys work great.
So like many folks on the interwebs, I love me some bacon. It’s a great breakfast any time meat that adds a lot of salty, fatty, goodness to pretty much any meal. When you combine that with the rich velvety flavor of good cheddar, and the slight tang of a good scallion? What’s not to love!
A Bit of Prep...
Now, as you can tell from the recipe below, the prep on this one is a bit involved for most waffles. That’s because you need to cook the bacon, and chop it up, and then chop up the scallions, etc. When trying to do all the prep day-of, it was a bit much, but it worked fine. But I did decide while frying up another plate of bacon that if this recipe were to be used for my upcoming waffle party? I’d definitely prepare the bacon ahead of time.
...and a Great Result
So prep work notwithstanding, the waffles that came out of the waffle iron were fantastic. Running with the loaded potato theme, we spooned some sour cream on top of them and it worked fantastically well.
E said they tasted just like potato skins without the potato, and that’s really what they’re like. I was a bit concerned that they’d be super heavy and greasy feeling, especially with our experience from the week before. But no! Granted, they were super filling – so where I might normally have three waffles, in this case I could only manage two. But those two didn’t feel heavy when eating them at all.
Bottom line? These savory waffles were a smashing success. They will definitely be taking pride-of-place in the waffle party coming up next week.
Potato Skin Waffles (Bacon, Cheddar, and Scallions)
3
servings30
minutes40
minutesAdapted (in language only) from Serious Eats' Bacon, Cheese, and Scallion Waffles recipe.
Do you like loaded potato skins? You know, the ones you can get at a good bar/pub that come loaded with bacon, and cheddar, and scallions? Then you'll love these savory waffles. E described them as potato skins without the potato, and really that's super accurate. This recipe makes a great batch of delicious, very filling waffles. The bacon, scallion, and cheese flavor really comes through in the batter and while they are very filling they are nice and crispy on the outside and fluffy on the inside.
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Ingredients
- Dry Ingredients
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 tsp salt
2 tbsp granulated sugar
- Wet Ingredients
2 cups buttermilk
2 tbsp unsalted butter
3 large eggs
1ish tbsp reserved bacon fat (from cooking the bacon)
cooking spray
- Mix-in Ingredients
6 - 8 oz bacon (typically about half a package)
6 - 8 oz grated cheddar cheese
6 - 8 fresh scallions
- Toppings (optional)
sour cream
Directions
- Cook the bacon. My personal recommendation is to cook the bacon in a large pan using a "low-and-slow" heating technique (about low-to-medium'ish on temp). Cook until the bacon is crispy, which in my experience is usually great when both sides of the bacon are bubbling nicely and the bacon has started to turn a lovely deep red shade (much more and it'll be burnt, so be careful here). Once the bacon is cooked, remove from the pan, pat it down to remove excess grease, and set it aside to cool.
- Reserve the bacon fat. If you're making everything in one go, just keep the pan warm to keep the fat liquid. Otherwise if you're preparing the bacon ahead of time, then pour the liquid into a microwave-safe mug (which once it's cool you can place in the fridge for a day or two). Be careful not to burn yourself!
- Slice the scallions. You'll want to keep the white bits and the light green colored bits, but get rid of the roots and the dark green bits (the roots for obvious reasons, but the dark green bits are too bitter to be good). Set these aside in a small bowl.
- Once the bacon has cooled, crumble it up. I personally like to take a large knife and go to town chopping the bacon into small bite-sized crumbled bits. Mix the bits in with the sliced scallions in the small bowl.
- In a large bowl, combine the dry ingredients. You'll want to whisk them pretty thoroughly to make sure they're evenly distributed.
- If you reserved the bacon fat beforehand, then take it out of the fridge and use a microwave (or the stove if you want to be really old-school) to melt the congealed fat.
- In a medium bowl, combine the wet ingredients (including the liquid bacon fat). Whisk the ingredients together until there are now major clumps of yolk or fat.
- Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients, and whisk together. Whisk it thoroughly until there are no spots of dry powder remaining.
- Add the crumbled bacon, chopped scallions, and cheese to the batter. Fold the new additions in slowly, making sure they're pretty well distributed.
- Preheat the waffle iron. I set mine to "Buttermilk" and used the highest temperature setting (7).
- Spray the waffle iron with cooking spray.
- Add the batter to the iron. I found that I used about 2/3 of a cup of batter for each waffle.
- When the iron is done, pull the waffles. If you need to set them aside, put them in an oven at 200 degrees to keep them warm while the next batch is in the iron.
- Serve with sour cream, and enjoy!
Equipment
Hercule (All-Clad Belgian Waffle Maker)
Notes
- This recipe has been adapted (in language only) from Serious Eats' Bacon, Cheese, and Scallion Waffles Recipe. Check out their site - it's got tons of great recipes (waffle or not).
- It's pretty convenient to cook and crumble the bacon the night before. Makes prepping stuff the day-of that much faster.
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