Monday, January 01, 2007

Hearty start to 2007

We hope everyone had a safe New Year's Eve - Welcome to 2007!
Happy New Years!

We just added up the new recipes we made in 2006 - crazy! We did just about 500 recipes... I wonder if we will break that this year!

What better way to start the new year than with a hearty warm breakfast? Again, I went to the King Arthur Flour Whole Grain Baking book and found a recipe for Hazelnut Waffles with Pear Compote. I actually made this last week and Jeff requested it again this morning. We received a gift at Christmas from friends out west that included some fresh crisp pears from the Harry & David company and this looked like a perfect way to finish them up! The first time I made these I had a bit of trouble - it was early in the morning and when I mixed up the ingredient list, the batter was so stiff and un-waffle like. It then dawned on me that the recipe did not call for any real liquid! I asked Jeff to read through it to make sure I was not missing anything, but after flipping through a couple other recipes, it looked like we found an omission. The other recipes in the book call for about a 1:1 ratio between the flour and liquids, so I ended up adding about a cup or so of buttermilk until it looked "right".

You can make these light, tangy and crisp waffles with a Belgian iron or you can use a conventional style maker as we did - if you want super-crisp waffles, I suggest using the Belgian though. Even though these golden waffles are completely whole-grain, we did not find any bitter or strong "wheat" taste some people detest when using whole-wheat flour. Spelt and oat flour are the main dry ingredients and have their flavor enhanced by finely ground toasted hazelnuts for a rich nutty background.

The compote is a simple mixture of sliced pears, apple cider, sugar, a bit of butter and fresh ginger root for a mild bite. Once the pears are tender and the liquids have a chance to thicken, a sweet hint of orange is added from Grand Marnier. Feel free to leave it out, but I highly suggest trying it as it adds a tantalizing zing to the pears. We were thinking of making some scrambled eggs to have along side, but we opted to enjoy these with just a couple slices of salty bacon I cooked up and quickly snapped a photo before digging in so the waffles would stay crisp.

4 comments:

  1. 500 new recipes!!! I'm speechless. Way to go! (How are you going to beat that!)

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  2. not only 500 recipes but 500 DELICIOUS , ORIGINAL & GREAT recipes !!! thanks again for your wonderful guys ...

    I wish you a "bonne année" . May 2007 brings you all you deserve !!!

    & HAPPY NEW YEAR to all of you, great members of the culinary in the country community .

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  3. Hello! Long-time reader & 1st time commenter here. Just wanted to say I love your blog and frequently print out recipes to try. I wanted to say thanks for the Spaghetti Pie recipe...it was a hit this fall when I made it--big enough a hit for it to be the main course for my Christmas Eve dinner (served with garlic-cheddar-chile biscuits and followed with a ricotta cheesecake, woo calories!). Anyway, thanks for sharing!

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  4. Erika - I don't know... but it will be fun to try!

    Sabine - Thank you! Happy New Year to you as well!

    Ms DaFarm - I'm excited to hear you liked the Spaghetti Pie! Your dinner sounds delicious (especially the cheesecake.. I love it, but just don't make it enough!)

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