The American waffle — a thick, grid-patterned breakfast bread cooked in a hinged iron until golden and crispy on the outside and tender within — descends from the Belgian waffle introduced at the 1964 New York World's Fair by Maurice Vermersch and his family from Brussels. Before 1964, American waffles were thinner, crispier, and closer to the Dutch *wafel* that colonial settlers had brought. The Belgian waffle — thicker, deeper-pocketed, lighter (often yeast-leavened or egg-white-lightened) — replaced the colonial version and became the American standard. Chicken and waffles (a combination of fried chicken atop a waffle, doused in maple syrup and hot sauce) is the African American expression that connects breakfast to dinner and sweet to savoury.
A thick, rectangular or round breakfast bread with a deep grid pattern (the pockets hold butter and syrup), golden-brown and crispy on the exterior, light and tender interior. The batter: flour, eggs (often separated — yolks into batter, whites beaten stiff and folded in for lightness), milk, butter, sugar, baking powder, vanilla. Some traditions use yeast instead of baking powder, producing a tangier, more complex-flavoured waffle.
1) Beating egg whites separately and folding in — this produces the light, airy interior that distinguishes a great waffle from a dense one. 2) The waffle iron must be hot — underdone waffles stick and steam rather than crisp. 3) Don't open the iron too early — the waffle must set before the lid is lifted. Steam escaping from the edges stops when the waffle is nearly done. 4) Serve immediately — waffles lose their crispness within minutes. A waffle held in a warm oven is a soft waffle.
Chicken and waffles: fried chicken (AM1-01) on top of a fresh waffle, maple syrup poured over both, hot sauce on the side. The combination is African American in origin (documented in Harlem in the 1930s at Wells Supper Club) and represents the sweet-savoury bridge that Southern cooking does better than any other American tradition. The Roscoe's House of Chicken and Waffles chain (Los Angeles, since 1975) is the most famous expression.
James Beard — American Cookery