Red velvet cake has given us such wonderful flavors and dessert options. The chocolatey cake with cream cheese frosting and that hint of red (or smack across the face of red) is both alluring and delicious. So, why not make them into a breakfast or brunch food? Decadence.
As with most things in life, the trick to these babies isn’t in what’s in them, but how they look. You’ve got to add a whole lot of red food coloring (pretty much a whole little squirt bottle unless you’re using gel coloring) and to make them perfect for a heart-shaped waffler like this beauty from Cucina Pro, you have to add enough batter to fill the spaces or else you end up giving the love of your life (or morning) an incompletely gesture of your affection with a misshapen heart. So, feel free to double this batch of batter to leave room for errors. The weird-looking waffles will save well in a bag in the freezer for whenever you want to pull them out and throw them in the toaster at a later date when perfectly shaped waffles aren’t crucial.
Total Time: 40 min
Prep: 20 min
Cook: 20 min
Yield: 2 servings
Ingredients:
Cream Cheese Glaze:
3 ounces cream cheese, softened to room temp
3 tablespoons butter, softened
1 cup powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 cup milk
Red Velvet Waffles:
1 cup buttermilk
3 tablespoons butter, melted and cooled
1 egg
1 teaspoons vanilla
1/4 teaspoon distilled white vinegar
1 tablespoon liquid red food coloring
1 cup flour
1/8 cup sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 – 1 tablespoon cocoa powder (I prefer more cocoa)
1/2 teaspoon table salt
Nonstick cooking spray
Directions
Make the cream cheese glaze first. It’s important to really be sure that both the cream cheese and butter are soft before you start this process or there will be little lumps, I guarantee it. But it tastes so good that if someone complains, just don’t let them have any. Win-win. With an electric mixer, whip the cream cheese and butter until smooth and fluffy. Then add the powdered sugar, vanilla, and milk and mix until smooth. Set aside.
For the waffles, whisk together the dry ingredients in a bowl and set aside. In a larger bowl, beat the buttermilk, melted butter, egg, vanilla, vinegar, and food coloring together until smooth. Add the dry ingredients to the buttermilk mixture and whisk or beat until smooth.
Heat a waffle iron according to the manufacturers’ instructions. Using this Cucina Pro Waffler made it easy for me to know when it was ready because it whistles like a teapot when it’s hot enough. The dog was a little startled by this at first, but that function is particularly handy as I’m multi-tasking and making bacon and eggs for the rest of the brunch. Choose a darkness setting that matches your taste; I went for the middle setting so that the waffles didn’t brown, because I wanted the red color to stay vibrant. Spray the waffle iron with nonstick cooking spray and then spray a 1/2 cup measuring cup with cooking spray as well, so it’s easier to get more batter from the bowl to the iron. Pour the batter into the waffle iron and cook until the waffler whistles (or about 3 minutes if you’re winging it without the audio clues.
Remove the waffle, drizzle (or douse) with the cream cheese glaze, and enjoy your brunch.
Video:
Red Velvet Waffles for Two – Lavender Magazine from Lavender Magazine on Vimeo.
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