Waffles for a Crowd

It took nearly seven years, but I have (maybe?) finally broken Mila of her Eggo addiction. The child has survived off of cheap frozen waffles all of her life, but only Eggo brand and don't you dare try to substitute any other brand because SHE WILL KNOW.

I still don't know how.

The annoying part of the whole thing is that she wasn't willing to even try homemade waffles.

Until recently.

Alexis made the exact same waffles I've been making approximately forever, and suddenly Mila was like, "These are acceptable," so now we're going to make them a lot. Frozen are fine, but it feels like a victory somehow that the Wild Beast known as Mila is beginning to appreciate the finer things in life.

FWIW, this is a great base recipe that can then be made super fancy in a million different ways. The ones below have pink food coloring, for example, but Mila's favorite are Apple Cinnamon Waffles.

Waffles for a Crowd

2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 1/4 cup milk

For apple cinnamon
1 granny smith apple, cored and grated
1/4 cup granulated sugar
2 teaspoons cinnamon

1. Turn your waffle maker on. (I have this one. Go ahead and guess who picked it out.)

2. In a large bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, and salt. Whisk together then add the eggs, vegetable oil, and milk and whisk until well combined.

3. Divide the batter up and let the crowd go wild. Chocolate chips, blueberries, chopped strawberries, vanilla extract, sprinkles, shaved chocolate, dried cranberries, raisins, mini M&Ms ... the possibilities are endless. It's worth noting that this recipe purposely doesn't have sugar in it -- add a little depending on what you mix in. Given the half-bottle of sprinkles that end up in the waffles at my house, no sugar was required. I did add some for the apple cinnamon ones, though.

One other tip - use gel food coloring if anybody decides they must have pink or purple or rainbow waffles. It takes far less gel coloring to get a deep color than regular stuff, so you won't risk ruining the taste or texture with food coloring.

4. Follow the directions that came with your waffle maker to cook the waffles, For mine, this recipe made four waffles for each of three girls. Then I made a second batch for the apple cinnamon and wound up with another dozen waffles.