Chocolate-Nut Belgian Waffles

These are really healthy as well as delicious!

If you've never ever made waffles before, even from a mix, and don't have someone in the house to help you, do try a more specific recipe for waffles first, because as you'll see I just add milk until the batter looks right. Someday maybe I'll actually measure and remove this warning!

Note that I don't think "normal" "flatter" waffle irons will work well for this; I have one of those thick Belgian waffle makers.

If you want these for breakfast and want to make it super easy while you're still sleepy, the night before mix the dry ingredients and wet ingredients and the cocoa-nut mixture separately. Of course refrigerate the wet ingredients. I love a new plastic covered huge mixing cup I got from Germany for the dry ingredients that has a pouring place; I use it for the major mixing bowl and for pouring onto the waffle iron.

Mix dry ingredients:
about 3 tablespoons sugar
1-1/2 cups whole wheat flour (if yours is really heavy substitute some white flour for part of this)
1/4 tsp baking soda

Mix wet ingredients separately:
2 eggs, beaten a bit until the yolk and white are mixed
bit less than 1/2 cup olive oil
2/3 cup milk (you'll add more later)
1 tablespoon white or rice wine vinegar 

Mix separately:
1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa (I used a mild one from England but I think any would be delicious)
1/3 cup coarsely chopped walnuts

When you're ready to cook, start heating the waffle iron. (Because I use only baking soda and vinegar, you have to use the batter soon after mixing it.) Pour the wet ingredients into the flour mixture and stir just a bit; stir in more milk to make it the consistency you want. When it looks right, just swirl through the cocoa-walnut mixture (you don't want it completely mixed in).

Bake on a waffle iron (or with thinner batter make pancakes).

Serve with a little bit of mild honey, fresh fruit, and a tiny sprinkling of coarse-grained sugar if you like.

Very adapted from a recipe for a delicious but not-half-as-healthy coffee cake (Cocoa Ripple Ring) in the 1981 Better Homes & Gardens New Cook Book!


(from this site's predecessor)

This Week's...Cookbook

It's just one this week, folks; one excellent reason for that is that I only have one unpacked (actually never packed because I treasure it so much I carried it with me in a suitcase from down south)! We got moved into our new house over the weekend.

We were completely tired of super easy (as in pretty much premade) foods and I so wanted some home cooking, though of course very easy as well -- after all, I had no knives unpacked, no measuring cups, etc etc. I have been getting fun ideas though from a cookbook in a sidebar:

Modern Meal Maker: 1115 Menus, 744 Recipes

Modern Meal Maker: 1115 Menus, 744 Recipes
by Martha Meade, from 1939
I may or may not have mentioned how great old cookbooks such as this can be at being thrifty -- and also remembering to have a great variety of vegetables. At the same time, I'm making it easy with already-cooked meats, cut vegetables, etc., and as always using her ideas to inspire my own. Let's see, we've already had a chef's salad I adapted from a menu idea -- eaten with bliss in our new conservatory; tonight we're having roast beef with apple slices and a dusting of cinnamon, with peas and cauliflower on the side with a grating of nutmeg (can you tell I found my spices?!), and some sweet potato "tots" done on top of the stove since I've not found any baking tins as yet -- but I am 100% sure this meal will be eaten in front of the TV because we've been without TV for 3 months -- and without TV cable for 15 years (I kid you not) and we feel like enjoying it!! 
Yikes, I better go downstairs and cook that repast, speaking of cooking...

Chicken in an Amazing Tamarind Sauce

Ayam Sioh in Malay. Adapted from THE BEST OF MALAYSIAN COOKING by Mrs. Leong Yee Soo.

Mix together in a container large enough for about 1.75 pounds of chicken pieces that you can cover and put in the refrigerator overnight:
3 oz sweet onions or shallots ground in a food processor
1-1/2 Tablespoons or a bit more very fresh coriander seeds ground up (roast very lightly in a skillet, cool, then whir in a coffee/spice grinder; they lose their flavor quickly -- as in a month or two -- after grinding but are amazing when fresh)
3/4 Tablespoon sugar (unfortunately necessary)
1/2 tsp or more black pepper
3/4 tsp salt
1 Tablespoon soy sauce (Kikkoman)
3/4 Tablespoon or more tamarind paste (Southeast Asian is best, but Indian is OK)

Add 1.75 pounds of chicken thighs (with bones, but skinless if you like), coating them with the above marinade.
Marinate overnight or all day (in the refrigerator). Do NOT remove marinade.
Put a generous splash of oil (I used about 2 Tablespoons very light olive oil) in a skillet and place the chicken and its sauce/marinade in it. Saute covered until done.

Freezes super well! But don't miss some served fresh and hot from the skillet!

(from previous incarnation of this site)

Malaysian Eggplant

If you hate eggplant, skip this; but otherwise it's super wonderful! Very adapted from THE BEST OF MALAYSIAN COOKING by Mrs. Leong Yee Soo.

Cut eggplant (big or little, not peeled) into about 1/2x2" pieces. Saute in some lighly flavored oil until very tender (cover, and add some water as necessary).
When done, just stir in to taste:
Thai fish sauce
sugar
Thai garlic-chili sauce

(Yes, that's a lot of Thai ingredients in a Malaysian dish. Mrs. Soo has things like shrimp paste which I can't get.)
 (This is from when we lived in a forsaken place overseas...)

An Exotic Delicious Malaysian Dinner

I made the following with ideas from THE BEST OF MALAYSIAN COOKING by "Mrs. Leong Yee Soo," which someone from Malaysia said was the most authentic of the Malaysian cookbooks I have. It requires overnight marination and a lot of ingredients that are difficult to get where I live, but it was well worth it.

Chicken in an Amazing Tamarind Sauce (Ayam Sioh) (see my recipe, to be posted in a few days)
Malaysian Eggplant (see my recipe, to be posted in a few days)
Steamed Rice
Cucumber Slices


(from a previous incarnation of this site, when we lived in a forsaken place!)