Light & Crisp Whole Wheat Waffles

These are hands-down my favorite waffles to date - light, crisp and much healthier than your average waffle recipe.  But no sacrifice on taste.  Try them out and see if you agree!

Origins
I'm a HUGE waffle aficionado.  But my downfall is that I'm also into healthy eating and fitness. My quest has been to find a waffle recipe that I could enjoy that would also not be terribly unhealthy.  So every time I make waffles (which isn't very often) I try a new recipe, make some healthy modifications and then see how my family likes them.  More often than not, the waffles would turn out really heavy, with a strong whole wheat flavor.  Passable with some strawberries and pure maple syrup, but not actually satisfying.  

What are my criteria for a great waffle?  They are simple - they need to be:

1. Healthy (or at least healthier than normal waffles)
2. Crisp (I like a slightly crispy texture on the outside, with a softer inside)
3. Tasty (without a heavy whole wheat aftertaste) 

I finally hit the nail on the head last Sunday with this recipe.  I have to give a lot of credit to the original recipe, which is called Donn's Waffles on the Martha Stewart web site.  But I made some significant modifications.

​INGREDIENTS
1 1/2 cups 1% milk
2 tablespoons white vinegar
2 jumbo eggs, separated
1 cup whole wheat pastry flour*
3/4 cup vanilla yogurt**
2 tablespoons coarse cornmeal
1 teaspoon baking soda
3 tablespoons salted butter, melted
Vegetable oil cooking spray, for waffle iron

*A note about the flour - this can either make or break the waffle.  If you get the normal whole wheat flour from the store, you won't like the taste.  Whole wheat pastry flour is still whole wheat, but has a much lighter and finer texture.  We actually grind our own whole wheat using whole white wheat.  If you can't find whole wheat pastry flour or grind whole white wheat, then mix 1/2 cup of regular whole wheat flour with 1/2 cup white flour.

**Yes, I know that vanilla yogurt has sugar in it and isn't always considered healthy.  You could try nonfat greek yogurt and just add a teaspoon of Vanilla extract.  We just didn't have any, so I used this.

DIRECTIONS
Preheat a waffle iron on the highest setting. Here's another important tip, I use a flipping waffle iron like this one except it wasn't so expensive.  The flipping is important to get a more light and crisp waffle.  

Stir together milk and vinegar; let stand for 5 minutes to thicken. Mix together yolks, flour, yogurt, cornmeal, and baking soda. Stir in milk-vinegar mixture. Stir butter into batter (do not overmix).

Beat whites with a mixer on high speed until stiff peaks form. Stir half into batter. Gently fold in remaining whites with a rubber spatula.

Coat waffle iron with cooking spray. Pour 1 cup batter into waffle iron (I spread it out so it barely covers the bottom of the iron). Close lid, and cook until waffle is golden and crisp (my iron beeps).  

Remove waffle from iron. Quickly toss between your hands to release steam and help retain crispness, and serve. Repeat with remaining batter.

SERVING
I like to spread with a little spreadable butter, then cut up fresh strawberries for the top.  Or you could do blueberries or any other kind of berry.  If you need syrup, a couple of tablespoons of pure maple syrup is a good choice (not the high fructose corn syrup-based syrups you get in the store).  You HAVE to eat these fresh off the iron.  These were SO light that most of us were able to eat two - almost the same as having two pancakes.  Past recipes I would freeze the leftover waffles and they would go uneaten until thrown out.  These leftovers have all been eaten already!

I'm salivating just thinking about these, make them soon and enjoy!