Waffles, pizzelle, gaufrettes, and gallettes — Oh my!
Jul 2nd, 2009 by jennifer
In our house, we end most evenings with a cup of tea and a couple of cookies. Recently, the cookies of choice were Jules Destrooper Butter Crisp cookies. When they’re not on sale, they’re crazy expensive. Flour, butter, sugar, and eggs are my forever friends so I couldn’t believe that I would be unable to recreate these sweet masterpieces myself.
Because anything worth doing is worth over-doing, this idea began an out-of-control spree. Late night internet searches, early morning cookbook perusals, and a few emergency trips to the market for more flour, marked my days.
In my travels, I discovered Fante’s. If you’ve never been there (I’ve only been on the internet), I highly recommend it. Last week, we settled on a middle-depth Belgian waffle cookie iron (model 1120) made in America by Palmer Corp. It arrived the second day after we ordered it.
As M pointed out, if it had a cloth-covered electrical cord, you’d swear it was made in 1942. The thing is indestructible and works like a charm.
Adding to the incredible specialness of the day, Lois in WI, mother of my adopted chicken Danger Hen, sent me a very special gift. The convergence of the waffle iron, a Piggly Wiggly shirt, and pound of butter filled my heart with a song!
We’ve tried three recipes with the Belgian waffle cookie (lukken) iron and decided that as yummy as they are, the cookies we were after are much thinner. The first recipe included a shot of vanilla (thank heaven’s I buy in bulk) and a shot of whiskey (also bought in bulk!). After a few taste tests, we agreed, these waffles are well suited for the task of wine biscuit or ice cream sandwich fodder.
More research, more baking, and more debating, brought a Palmer Pizzelle iron into our lives.
The first recipe for pizzelle was great. It involved egg whites only, whipped into soft peaks with other ingredients added later. This made for a lovely light and crisp cookie but not the same as the Jules Destrooper biscuits. Recipe #2 was a bit of a disaster (cookie clinging to each part of the pizzelle iron. I can take the blame for this. I separated out the egg whites and yolks, beating the whites, adding the other ingredients, and adding in the beaten yolks later. There is also the suspect addition of baking powder to this recipe. This batter did make for lovely crisp sugar cookies, but it is not to be used in the iron.
I didn’t think I could face a day at work with such a cookie disaster still hanging over me, so I tried the very basic pizzelle recipe that came with the Palmer pizzelle iron. The recipe also includes baking powder, and it worked like a charm, but it is very bland. After baking half of the dough, I decided to add a couple handfuls of light brown sugar. This added just the touch of sweetness they needed. During this process, I perfected my techniques for loading the iron with just enough batter, as well as that of waiting for the iron to stop steaming.
After work I’ll be heading the the Large Mart, filling my cart with butter, sugar, eggs, and flour (my friend Sally hooked me up with extra vanilla last night). I’ll let you know how my quest continues…
