...and in the mornin' I'm makin' WAFFLES!

 Today is post 100!  Woot!

Today I want to share a recipe I discovered recently for super delicious waffles.  I might play around with the flour combinations a bit - I've been playing with pancake combos like wheat, buckwheat, and corn flour (which turned out awesomely).  I'll share some pancakes with you next week.

Lately I've been really into soaking things.  I even tried soaking popcorn.  I've also been really into pairing things with fruits high in vitamin C, especially for breakfast.  So here is an awesome waffle recipe I came up with:

Soaked Strawberry Almond Waffles

1 cup unbleached flour
3/4 cup whole wheat flour
1 Tbs baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
2 eggs
1 Tbs whey
1 3/4 cups filtered water
1/2 cup cooking oil
chopped, soaked (not dried) almonds
diced strawberries

Combine the flour, whey, and water in a bowl.  Cover and let sit overnight.  In the morning, whisk mixture until smooth, add eggs, baking powder, salt and cooking oil, mixing until combined.  Fold in chopped almonds and diced strawberries to taste.
I used almonds that were soaked but not dried and I found that the waffle maker cooks them just right so you have crunchy nut bits in your waffles.  I've used dried soaked almonds as well, and that's good too, but I like the texture the wet ones give to the waffles much better.

To soak the almonds:

4 cups almonds
1 Tbs salt
filtered water

Combine, cover, and let sit overnight.  Drain and rinse in the morning.

With the remaining almonds (because there's no way you can fit 4 cups of almonds in your waffle batter) you can make almond milk, or you can dry them in a warm oven for 12-24 hours for snacking awesomeness or to make almond butter.  Or you can do both!

To make almond milk:

1 cup soaked almonds (not dried)
4 cups filtered water
cheesecloth, nut-milk bag, or thin material for straining

Put the almonds and 2 cups of water into a blender (or all 4 if your blender is huge) and blend until smooth (I gave it 5 minutes just for good measure).  Pour the almond mixture and extra water into a bowl lined with a straining cloth.  Squeeze as much liquid out of the pulp as you possibly can.  Enjoy.

Supposedly you can use the pulp for baking after you dry it thoroughly, and I'll be giving that a shot because I'm weird about throwing edible things away.  I'll let you know how that turns out - I'm going to try to make flour-less brownies with it.