Pina Colada Waffles

Coconut milk is becoming one of my favorite ingredients to use in baking. We had a lot of fresh pineapple that needed to be used, and I thought it would be fun to serve it over a tropical waffle. I was planning on inventing my own recipe, but then I remembered this one. Joshua helped me make these, and we had a lot of fun working together. We served these with pineapple heated up in a butter-rum sauce. But I think they would be even better with coconut syrup (the recipe is on The Sister’s Café blog). This recipe for waffles is from Alton Brown’s cookbook “I’m Just Here for More Food.”

2 cups (9 ½ ounces) all-purpose flour (Note: Alton uses a different weight for flour—I measured the flour by weight rather than cups.)
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
3 large eggs, beaten
4 tablespoons butter, melted and cooled slightly
2 cups (16 ounces) coconut milk (at room temperature)
3 tablespoons (1 ½ ounces) sugar
½ cup (2 ¾ ounces) drained crushed pineapple

Mix together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in large mixing bowl. In small mixing bowl, mix together eggs, butter, coconut milk, sugar and crushed pineapple. Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients and mix until dry ingredients are just incorporated. Set the batter aside to rest for 5 minutes (or refrigerate it for up to an hour). Ladle batter onto waffle iron using a muffin scoop and spread the batter lightly with the back of the scoop. Close waffle iron and bake until the waffle is golden and crisp on both sides. Serve immediately or keep warm in a 200°F. oven until ready to serve.

Coconut Syrup
(from The Sister's Cafe)
7-8 T. butter
¾ c. buttermilk
1 c. sugar
½ tsp baking soda
1 tsp coconut extract

Place butter, buttermilk and sugar in a pot. Then turn stove on medium and stir until butter melts and sugar dissolves. Bring to a boil and boil one minute. Remove from heat and add soda and flavoring. It will bubble up; just continue to stir and give it a few minutes for the 'fizz' to reduce before serving.