I reentered the keto world about the time that chafflepalooza began. YouTube had videos, Pinterest was stuffed full of links, there were even Facebook groups dedicated to the chaffle, you could hardly read a word about keto without hearing about chaffles.
I was not impressed; IME, kitchen gadgets are bought, barely used, then recycled and I’ve already owned waffle irons before. The typical chaffle is made with a Dash one-waffle maker; the basic recipe calls for 1 egg plus 1/2 cup shredded cheese to make 2 chaffles. I didn’t see why I’d want to do them one at a time; until I can buy half-eggs, I wanted to make at least 2.
But I’d mentioned a desire for one to my yard-sale-addicted husband and one day he came home with a $2 waffle maker that makes 2 square waffles at once.
He’d bought a kitchen gadget no one had ever used. I googled the manufacturer and found a bunch of links to QVC and HSN, but to other products. Then I googled the model number and found a woman posting in 2013 that she had lost the manual for her 10-year old waffle maker and no one replied, so I was not going to be able to find out what volume batter should be used. And certainly, there’d be no Amazon reviews to consider.
I realized how I’d gotten this so cheap; someone bought it off a late-night infomercial, likely under the influence, and realized they were never going to make waffles and stuck it in a closet for 20 years, then recently cleaned out that closet.
So armed with my “new” 20-year old waffle maker, with a nonstick surface likely made with some sort of toxic finish, I proceeded to experiment with chaffles. My first experiment did not go well, as I hadn’t yet figured out how to spread the egg to cover both grids.
I hunted down the original chaffle recipe for this post, though there’s literally hundreds of recipes out there.
Chaffles themselves are rather bland and boring, as such they do make a good replacement for bread. You need to cook them long enough to get crispy, they tend to be rather bendy when removed from the waffle-maker even so, but cooling on a rack for a minute or two makes them crispy. People have reported refrigerating them or even freezing them and recrisping in a toaster.
I’ve experimented with various cheeses, but have found my standard whole milk shredded mozzarella works best. That’s what the nutrition facts reported here are based on.
So if I have a smallish dinner planned, or am particularly hungry, and decide to make a couple chaffles, I either add a bit of Everything But The Bagel Seasoning to the egg or some garlic butter to the finished chaffle to punch up the flavor profile.
But I don’t make chaffles very often. The fact is, this “easy to clean” waffle maker isn’t.
Bits of crumbs sometimes get stuck in the grids, and even when that doesn’t happen, because you’re melting cheese right on the griddle, there’s grease left behind, which can only be cleaned up by shoving the corner of a paper towel into all the indentations.
If I were going to do this on a regular basis, I’d want removable plates so I could wash it properly. And I’d prefer a 4-waffle maker as well, so I could make twice as much in the same time, given they freeze well. The item shown here is on my wish list; feel free to buy it for me! 🙂
But for now, given I rarely need an extra 260 calories, I’m OK with not making them often.
