3 September: Waffles

The first week in September is National Waffle Week. Here are 10 things you might not know about waffles:

1. National Waffle Week isn’t the only waffle related celebration. There’s also International Waffle Day on 25 March and National Waffle Day on 24 August, which was the date when the delightfully named Cornelius Swarthout received the first U.S. patent for the waffle iron in 1869.

2. Arguably, waffles have been around since ancient Greece. The Greeks used hot metal plates to make cakes they called obelios, although they were possibly more like wafers than waffles.

3. By the 9^th and 10^th centuries, wafer irons or moule à oublies had made an appearance. These irons made communion wafers with crucifixion scenes imprinted on them.

4. The first known waffle recipe was written in the 14^th century in an anonymous manuscript called Le Ménagier de Paris, in which a husband had written down instructions to his wife on how to make the dish. It wasn’t quite waffles as we know them, yet, as the recipe contained no leavening.

5. The word waffle first appeared in the English language in Robert Smith’s Court Cookery in 1725. The recipe begins: "Waffles. Take flower, cream…"

6. The word waffle comes from the Old German wefan, which meant to weave something into the shape of a honeycomb.

7. Waffles have inspired inventors at least twice. In 1904 an Ice cream seller ran out of cups in which to serve ice cream at the St. Louis World Fair. With the help of a nearby waffle seller, he came up with the idea of the ice cream cone using folded waffles. In 1971 they inspired a non-food item: the soles of Nike trainers. Bill Bowerman was watching his wife make waffles for breakfast when he realised the pattern would make an ideal sole for a running shoe. He even used a waffle iron to create the first Nike trainer sole.

8. You can get waffles on a stick. Waffles on a stick are long waffles cooked onto a stick, usually dipped in something like Chocolate syrup, and with sprinkles on top.

9. The tallest stack of waffles (at time of writing) is 91.5 cm (36.02 in), achieved by Francis De Buck and Michel De Buck in Blankenberge, Belgium, on 28 June 2020.

10. The largest waffle ever was created by Stitching Gouda Oogst in the Netherlands in 2013. It was eight feet long.

Character birthday

Verity Brent, Electric Blue’s mother.