Liege - Waffles made to travel

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We make a special kind of Belgian waffle, the Liege waffle (pronounced lee-edge). Invented in the middle ages in the city of Liege, it is a unique member of the waffle family. Made with yeast, eggs, milk, and butter, it's something like brioche. But it's the addition of pearl sugar, made from beets, that makes Liege waffles more like sweet, crunchy pastries than the fluffy Belgian waffles you know.

Like pastries, Liege waffles are perfect to take on the go. And because they are made like bread, you can get a bunch today and toast them up tomorrow. We pair them with dark chocolate, whipped cream, and matcha, but truthfully they are great just as they are.

One ingredient, more than any other, makes Liege waffles unique. Pearl sugar. The Belgian pearl sugar we use is made from sugar beets, which are much bigger (3-5 pounds) and lighter in color than the small, red beets at the supermarket. Beet sugar doesn't have to be processed into pearl-sized nibs, but we're glad someone thought to do it that way. 

When this sugar heats up inside the iron, it caramelizes perfectly inside the waffle and around its crisp edges. When your bite of waffle has one of these white pearls in it, the texture is lightly crunchy and gently sweet. Unforgettable.

Thank goodness for pearl sugar!

Like many breads, our waffles start as water, yeast, flour, salt, eggs, milk, and a bit of sugar. Once that's all mixed to form smooth strands of gluten, we add our favorite ingredient: butter. Then it's more mixing until the dough looks soft and shiny.

Our waffle dough goes through three stages of rising, or proofing, including one period of low-temperature overnight proofing. During this time, the yeast develops and prepares the dough to be delicious.

Finally, we mix in the pearl sugar and divide the dough into balls that go into the iron. By this time, the yeast has fully transformed, the ingredients have gotten to know each other, and the flavor of the baked waffle is a gift from the culinary gods.

Like a good croissant, a Liege waffle should be a food you can eat every day. For us, this means using simple ingredients you can pronounce. Butter, eggs, flour, sugar. No artificial flavors or colors, no preservatives, no conditioners to speed up the natural processes of gluten and yeast. We like sugar as much as anyone, but we use only as much as the waffles need, just enough to make the flavors sing. We love the natural brown of cocoa, the red of ruby chocolate, the green of matcha, the golden yellow of baked dough.

We eat our waffles every day, and so do our kids. When you finish one of our waffles, you should feel good inside and want to eat another (without going crazy, of course). This is the kind of food our waffles are made to be.