Karen's Adventures in Cooking: Hash Brown Waffles

One of my goals for 2016 is to go through all my unused appliances that I just HAD to have (waffle iron, ice-cream maker, etc…) and either use it or lose it.

I saw a few hash brown waffle recipes and I LOVE crispy hash browns so I thought this would make perfect use of my - only used once - waffle iron.

Hash Brown Waffles attempt #1:

I started with this simple one from Serious Eats. It’s very basic – just potatoes and seasonings. I peeled and grated the potato then squeezed out all the liquid.

Then I buttered the grid and heaped the potatoes on. You can add quite a bit when using a Belgian Waffle iron like I have. It presses down as it cooks. Cook on medium high heat for about 5 minutes and voila! you have a hash brown waffle.

Honestly, I wasn’t too impressed with this one. And quite a few people have felt the same. It’s not super crispy like in their pic (& believe me – I squeezed all the moisture out first…making a mess of my towel.

For me this wasn’t worth the effort.

Hash Brown Waffles attempt #2:

Undeterred, I tried a second recipe from Damn Delicious. She uses eggs as a binder and fills the mixture with extra goodies like ham & cheese – making it more of an anytime of day meal.

Instead of grating my own potatoes, I used Simply Potato refrigerated hash browns (found in the dairy section). Alexia also makes fantastic frozen potato products but I can have the seasoned hash browns because of the onion.

I mixed the potato, eggs, ham, cheese, seasonings together and proceeded as above but with MUCH better results!

These were perfect. Crispy on the outside, tender and flavorful on the inside. She uses a regular waffle iron in her recipe so the waffles come out thinner and more like toast. Mine were HUGE and very filling. I got 4 waffles out of the recipe instead of her 6. Don’t be afraid to really fill the grid – it squishes down. And be sure to really butter the waffle iron first to prevent sticking.

I would definitely make this version again and it’s super adaptable. Use all veggies instead of meat – change up the cheeses/spices, use bacon instead of ham.

Hash brown waffles seem to be hit or miss for a lot of people so I guess you just have to play around and find the right recipe for your waffle iron.

Verdict: The waffle iron stays. For now.

The first, plain, recipe didn’t work at all but recipe #2 looked and tasted delicious and I found it to be way more versatile.