How To Make Waffles Without a Waffle Maker

You are caught in a dilemma. You want to make waffles for breakfast and suddenly you remember that you don’t have a waffle maker. You are about to give up and try something else when you rack your brains to search in the recesses of your mind to recall anything you have heard about making waffles without a waffle maker.

You scour your kitchen and look at all the gadgets you have there. You shortlist a few of them and try to think how each one can replace a waffle maker.

Your search and thinking ends up with two alternative ways in which you can make waffles without a waffle maker – the grill pan and egg or waffle mold.

Using a grill pan to make waffles

The grill pan is a versatile appliance found in any kitchen. It is a very popular gadget because it can make almost anything that needs cooking on a stove – meats, vegetables and sandwiches. The grill pan comes in handy for making waffles if you don’t have a waffle maker and can also serve as an alternative to the stovetop waffle maker.

Making Waffles with Grill Pan

Steps to follow

Since you are familiar with using a grill pan, making waffles with it is quite simple if you follow the steps outlined below.

You will need the following:

  • Cooking stove
  • Grill pan
  • Waffle batter
  • Cooking oil and butter
  • Ladle or batter dispenser
  • Spatula

Step 1: Place the grill pan on the stove and heat it up for a few minutes. Test the surface by spraying a little water. If the grill sizzles then it is ready to receive the batter. Apply a few drops of cooking oil and spread it on the grill.

Step 2: Stir the batter using the ladle or a mixer and then use the ladle or the batter dispenser to pour the stirred batter on the sizzling pan just as you would do for pancakes. Use more quantity of batter to make it thicker than you would for pancakes. Let the batter heat up for a few minutes. You can add butter to taste and to ensure batter does not stick to the pan.

Step 3: After the base of the batter turns golden brown flip the cooked batter using a spatula to cook the other side. Cook it to match the first side. Add butter to taste.

Step 4: Remove the cooked waffle and serve with whatever toppings you fancy.

You can follow the simple steps above to make as many waffles as you like. And remember to enjoy your waffle while they are still hot 🙂

Using any type of mold to make waffles

Apart from the grill pan, you can use other gadgets that you may have in the kitchen. Any type of mold – egg mold or just the set of waffle mold, if you have it instead of the waffle maker. You can use the mold to cook the batter in a cooking oven.

Make Waffle with Waffle Mold

Steps to follow

You will need the following:

  • Cooking oven
  • Mold that fits in the oven
  • Baking sheet
  • Waffle batter
  • Butter
  • Ladle or batter dispenser
  • Spatula

Step 1: Get the oven ready by preheating it to about 400 degrees. Also, get the batter ready by stirring it to attain consistency.

Step 2: Clean the mold and place it on the baking sheet. Lightly spray the insides of the mold with butter to taste as well as attain non-stick properties. Use the ladle to pour the batter into the molds ensuring you level the batter off inside the mold compartments.

Step 3: Place the baking sheet and the molds with batter into the oven. Cook for 8-10 minutes until the cooked batter turns golden brown.

Step 4: Take out the baking sheet and mold. Upturn the mold on to the baking sheet so that the base of the cooked batter faces up. Ensure you use gloves to avoid getting burned.

Step 5: Place the baking sheet along with the upturned cooked batter into the oven and cook for 3-5 minutes until the bottom turns golden brown. Now, the top and bottom are golden brown and the waffle is ready.

Step 6: Remove the cooked batter which is now waffles.

Step 7: Follow the earlier steps if you want to make more waffles.

Eat the waffle when it is hot with your desired toppings.

Innovate

The good thing about not using a waffle maker is that you can create any shape you want. For instance, you can make a triangular shape or an oval shape or even, if you are artistic enough, to the shape of your favorite characters or objects – Death Star, Millennium Falcon, Mickey Mouse or Minnie Mouse or any other shape you desire.

The main difference between making waffles with a waffle maker and a grill pan is the fact that your waffle is cooked in the open in a grill pan whereas in the waffle maker you cook between two waffle plates in a closed environment. Obviously, the difference shows in the final product. The waffle may resemble a pancake but it will taste like a waffle – crisp on the outside and fluffy and soft inside.

When making waffles without using a waffle maker, the waffles turn out differently because butter used reacts differently in an open environment as opposed to the enclosed environment in a waffle maker, whereby the two waffle plates encloses the batter while the it is cooking.

Since the waffle maker is a dedicated product to making waffles only, you as a cook will have to innovate and spend the time to see that your waffles come out well. Also, the waffle maker has enough safeguards and control functions that can help cook waffles faster.

Without using the waffle maker, you have to dedicate more time focused on the cooking to ensure you don’t overcook or under cook the waffles.

As you begin to use these methods more and more you will learn to determine the optimal method of making better waffles. You can experiment with different batters and with different ingredients. You could try one type of batter for cooking using a grill pan and another type of batter for cooking using a mold and oven. You can increase or decrease the size of the batter on the grill pan. You can also try out different shapes in smaller groups.

Whatever you do you, you can make making waffles without a waffle maker enjoyable by experimenting with it.