This year, both rain and covid threatened to thwart our vegan waffle party plans, but we allowed neither to stand in our way. Vegan waffles for the win!
We kept this year’s waffle party pretty small, with a dozen of us total, masking indoors and eating outdoors. Alongside a handful of local friends, we enjoyed a visit from two special out-of-state guests.
Bungee cords + eyelet screws + a giant blue 11- by 23-foot tarp + squirrels looking at me like I just built them an amusement park ride = rain couldn’t cancel this waffle party. Oh, and some duct tape grommet reinforcements, of course.
Here’s how determined I was to make things work: I discovered that my adjustable PowerBlock dumbbells could be used to weight down a ladder, which in turn served as a support for the center of the tarp.
Neighbors kindly lent us their portable canopy as a backup in case the tarp failed.
This year I made Vegan Sourdough Waffles and Dave’s Fave Waffle Party Waffles (gluten-free), both in the revised and expanded Global Vegan Waffle Cookbook.
I followed my usual routine of measuring out ingredients in advance. For non-yeasted wheat-based waffles, this simply means putting the dry in bowls and wet in mason jars. Then, shortly before the party, I give the jars a good shake and pour the wet ingredients into the dry.
For gluten-free and yeasted waffles, it’s slightly more complicated: For the gluten-free waffles I keep the ground flaxseed separate and add that when mixing the rest of the wet ingredients with the dry. For the sourdough waffles, I don’t mash the banana until I’m ready to mix the coconut milk and remaining water into the overnight-fermented flour mixture; and I also add the baking powder and baking soda at that point.
Because the outdoor tarp preparations took longer than anticipated, I had less time for last-minute food prep than usual. Fortunately, I was surrounded by great creativity. Megan helped with various aspects of getting things put out at the last minute, and got the coconut cream whipped. Megan’s mom, Sarah, added some flair to my homemade hummus and transformed a pineapple into a delightful centerpiece.
A waffle party would not be complete without lots of delicious toppings. We provided some vegan waffle toppings to get things started, and guests brought other delicious and creative toppings for the vegan waffle bar.
Vegan toppings on the waffle bar ranged from sweet to savory and included the following:
- maple syrup
- peanut butter
- Dark Chocolate Syrup (the GVWC also has many variation ideas)
- chocolate chips
- Salted Rum Caramel
- bananas
- candied ginger
- chai spice coconut honey butter
- whipped coconut cream
- caramelized onions
- baked apples with cinnamon
- vegan lemon curd
- Cran-Rhubarb Sage Jam from Johnson Berry Farm
- Boysenberry Grapefruit Sea Salt Jam from Alchemist’s Jam
- strawberries
- blueberries
- pineapple
- homemade hummus
- walnuts
One fun fact about the peanut butter is that it came from the bulk section of employee-owned WinCo Foods. They have cool nut butter machines that churn out freshly made peanut, almond, and cashew butters. Good stuff! I also like their dairy-free chocolate chips, and I purchase many of my waffle-making ingredients from their bulk section.
One of my new favorite flavor combinations is dark chocolate, salted rum caramel, candied ginger, and banana. I may also need to try that on a dairy-free ice cream sundae soon.
Speaking of salted rum caramel, here it is drizzling from a spoon. It’s flanked by chocolate on both sides. Yum!
Now that you’ve seen many of the toppings, let’s see how they looked on some of the waffles.
This is a different angle of the waffles pictured at the beginning. I’m honestly not sure which waffle quarter I would eat first; they all look so delicious. I’m kinda liking that double chocolate (with both dark chocolate syrup and chocolate chips) and peanut butter one. I mean, all the toppings were amazing, but I really, really do like chocolate.
Moving on to the next delicious plateful, I love thinking about the flavor of the chocolate and peanut butter topped waffle piece, and I love the bright colors of the coconut creme and fruit-topped piece. The latter looks like something fitting for a 4th of July waffle party. It’s also safer, quieter, and more nourishing than many things people play with on that holiday. It will cause an explosion of flavor fireworks in your mouth, though! And, of course, the random pieces of banana alongside the waffles make the whole display look more artsy.
Look at this richly, thickly topped vegan waffle sundae. Lots of coconut cream, lemon curd, dark chocolate syrup, salted rum caramel, bananas, strawberries, blueberries. It leaves nothing to the imagination.
If you stare at it long enough, and imagine the waffle on the right as a head with a teeny-tiny pink tip on its nose, the pile of toppings in the center as a body, and the waffle on the left as a cat butt arched up, it starts to look like a cat ready to pounce. Yep, a vegan waffle cat.
I enjoy the pattern that the chocolate drizzle makes atop the coconut cream on this waffle. And look at all that chocolate filling the sourdough waffle’s holes! Those blueberries on the left look tasty, too.
The next vegan waffle arrangement looks like an upside-down waffle angel with a banana slice head, pineapple hair bow, apple-waffle wings, and a strawberry-waffle dress. Every time my baking timer beeps, a vegan waffle angel gets its wings!
While the prior one was all sweet, the next waffle includes a savory waffle quarter to go with the two sweet ones.
I remember trying chocolate with the strawberries, but I don’t believe I tried the caramel, baked apple, and banana together–I bet that piece was really delish.
Drizzle on that chocolate syrup. Oooooh, yeeeah!
The caramelized onion topping, by the way, was great on its own. The guest who made it left some of the leftovers, and they also worked well on a veggie burger that evening.
Now we come to a waffle arrangement that truly looks like a complete meal. Like, if you had a kid who was the world’s pickiest eater, and you wanted to make them a vegan waffle lunch, this is what it would look like. All their friends would envy them.
Actually, it would probably look nothing like the photo below after bouncing around in a lunchbox on a bus. In reality, it probably wouldn’t look that appetizing, and your kid might be embarrassed. But in your heart, you’d know that at least you tried.
Pieces of Peenie the Pineapple jumpin’ out atcha!
Soooo much rich caramel drizzle on this waffle. Alongside the sweet, they’re also doing a bit of savory with the hummus and caramelized onion topped waffle in the background. I wonder which piece they ate first.
I love the drizzles of caramel and chocolate syrup on the banana accompanying these gluten-free vegan waffle pieces.
The colors of the preceding and following waffle photos are somewhat off due to the blue rain tarp hanging overhead. I was able to correct them a bit but not entirely.
This baked apple and waffle arrangement has a springlike color palette.
We finish our vegan waffle photo parade with a savory selection: caramelized onions with a dollop of hummus on the side. And a pineapple bit triad for a sweet afterthought.
Earlier I mentioned that we had two special out-of-state visitors. Our guests this year included Mimi Torres, who has been hosting vegan waffle parties since 2010. She was visiting Portland with her partner the weekend of our event, and I was very excited that they were able to make it! I also enjoyed talking with both of them about cycling and sustainable transportation, among other things. You can learn more about Mimi on the vegan waffle party wall of hosts.
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If you’d like to host your own vegan waffle party, this site has everything you need, including vegan waffle recipes, topping recipes and ideas, and waffle party hosting tips. You can also find much of this in The Global Vegan Waffle Cookbook, which helps to support this site.
It was an amazing affair with scrumptious waffles and, of course, a magnificent Waffle King Host! Filled with gratitude and waffles!
Sally, Thank you for the kind words, and it was a joy to have you!