Fellow waffle enthusiast here! What model did you go with?
Try peanut butter dessert sauce made with maple syrup as a topping:
This is my "99% waffle recipe". Still chasing the unicorn of perfection:
Dry stuff:
1 & 1/3 cup All-purpose flour
1/4 cup & 2 Tablespoons Powdered sugar (not granulated)
1/2 teaspoon Kosher salt (not table salt)
1/2 teaspoon Baking Soda
1/2 teaspoon Baking Powder
Wet stuff:
1 & 3/4 cup Cultured Lowfat Buttermilk
3 Tablespoons Melted Unsalted Butter (just microwave in a bowl for 30 seconds)
2 large Egg Whites
1 teaspoon Vanilla extract
Instructions:
1. Preheat waffle iron to MEDIUM (the notch halfway between 3 & 4 on my Belgian Flip). This is not a high-heat-friendly recipe!
2. Mix the dry stuff.
3. Whisk in the wet stuff until nice & smooth (regular whisk or Danish dough hook, both work fine).
4. Spray Pam onto waffle maker & pour mixture in.
5. Cook for around 3 minutes per side. It should beep when it's ready to flip, and then beep again when it's done. Mine took around 6-7 minutes. Adjust to your particular iron.
This is light, slightly sweet, and slightly crispy. In short, (almost) the perfect waffle.
I ordered the
Oster 8" Nonstick Belgian Waffle Maker with Temperature Control, Silver $23.87. It's the same price at Amazon and Walmart. I picked Walmart because I routinely order 64oz bags of nonfat dry milk powder from them, so I tossed in a bag ($20.66) to get their >=$35 free shipping.
I chose deliver together for eco-friendliness but the milk came Sunday anyway. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
The Oster waffler is cheap, yeah, but much more advanced than what I've used for 15 years, the Proctor-Silex Belgian style waffle iron, which has zero controls. Just plug that in and a light goes on that's hard to see. It goes off when the iron is hot enough for batter and when the waffle is presumably done, by virtue of the thermostat. No light goes on, no beep. If it's quiet I can tell when it's turned off, it makes a funny noise, a little creak. It's OK, but sometimes they don't come out as crispy/dry as I'd like. It's not consistent. I dropped the darn thing last Friday and the shell broke. I could try gluing it back together, but shopped instead. I have another Proctor-Silex, and been using it since, it's way older, I bought it in 2010. I was keeping as a spare since 2018 when I decided I wanted another waffler. I knew about the Oster then, but decided on another Proctor-Silex that I found online at Mercari, used but new looking, but it's busted now.
The Oster gets high reviews for a cheap iron. I've always had good luck with Oster blenders and accessories. It has a temperature control and evidently it doesn't just turn off.
My recent waffle recipe:
I keep a sourdough culture in the fridge, which I replenish every few days lately because I use it to make a waffle every day or two. I replenish the starter with equal weights of all purpose flour and water. I goose it a bit in the microwave (to get it a bit warm), then put it in my oven where the pilot light keeps it between 80-85F for a few hours of proofing, then I put it back in the fridge.
My 1st step in making a waffle is plug in the waffle iron (current one has no control, it just starts heating, but I figure with the Oster, I'll have it on high initially)
In a bowl I place:
1/2 a beaten large egg (the other 1/2 gets refrigerated, likely used for the next time I make a waffle)
3.75oz (or so) of the sourdough starter
0.38oz (or so) EV olive oil
0.75 (or so) water
1.00oz of my DIY waffle mix (explained below)
Beat well with a silicone spatula. When the waffler is hot enough (light goes out on mine and it makes a creaking sound): Pour in the batter and spread evenly either with spatula or by tilting the waffler or both, sprinkle about 1 tablespoon sesame seeds on top and close the iron. I don't use cooking oil spray. Once seasoned, the waffler hasn't needed it (I finally discovered) as long as I put that 0.38oz or so of oil in the batter. It seems, from reviews, that most people do spray their waffler, but I haven't found it necessary. I picked up some avocado oil spray at Costco today. I don't expect I'll need it with the new waffler but will probably use it the first time or two until I'm confident it isn't necessary and then use it for skillet duties only. It's rated to 500F without smoking.
My DIY waffle mix (enough for about 12 waffles):
8.4oz all purpose flour (I use the organic from Costco)
7oz whole wheat flour (I use the cheap organic from Whole Foods, about the only thing I ever buy there!)
0.55oz baking powder
0.2oz salt
1oz sugar
2.4oz non-fat dry milk powder
I put all that in a large container and shake it up to thoroughly mix and store in a quart jar.
How I serve my waffle:
I lately spoon some plain yogurt on it then a spoon of my homemade plum sauce made from the plum trees in my backyard and sugar (I canned likely more than 2 gallons of that over the summer). Various other toppings would work, of course. I used to put 1oz of chopped dates into the batter for sweetness and would usually skip syrup when I did that.