In the Kitchen with Waffle Pantry

You are thinking of adding Liege waffles to your menu and are wondering how to easily prepare and store your dough. Whether you store Liege waffle dough in the refrigerator or freezer the goal is to retain its quality. We want to ensure that you and your customer can enjoy perfect Liege waffles any time of day.

Adding Liege Waffles to Your Menu

The process of preparing Liege waffles regularly and in high volumes can be simplified and made stress-free for all. In order to serve freshly-baked Liege waffles throughout the course of the day, we have developed streamlined solutions for our business customers to use. Hobby bakers at home can of course use these methods as well.

Make Ahead Liege Waffle Dough

You can choose to prepare Liege waffle dough from scratch by using our Liege waffle recipe and Belgian pearl sugar or ease the process by using our authentic Liege waffle mix. The way you store the dough and prepare the waffles will be the same regardless of which route you choose. If you make the dough in advance and store it properly, it’s not necessary to prepare dough from scratch on a daily basis. Preparing dough in advance saves time and effort, allowing you to focus on other tasks.


💡 Did you know most businesses choose to prepare dough once a week and store it for later use?

Here’s an example of a scenario where you prepare your dough on Sunday for the week ahead:

1. 1. Mix all ingredients with the exception of butter and pearl sugar for 3 minutes at medium speed. Next, add the butter and continue to mix for 2-3 minutes at medium speed. Do not add the pearl sugar yet (more on this later). Cover the dough with a kitchen towel and let it rise.
      
      
   2. Subdivide the dough into 7 large batches, one batch for each day of the coming week. Place 6 batches in the freezer and one batch in the fridge. You can store the batches in freezer bags or lidded containers. The batch you place in the fridge you are good to use for 24 hours and it should be intended for the next day use (in this case, Monday). The other six batches in the freezer are for any period exceeding 24 hours (Tuesday to Sunday). The pearl sugar will rest in the dough for 20 to 30 minutes while the dough comes to room temperature.
      
      
   3. On Monday morning or within an hour of your desired baking time, remove the batch from the refrigerator and mix in pearl sugar. This is also the same amount of time required for your commercial cast iron waffle maker to reach its desired temperature (365°F or 185°C).
      
      
   4. Keep the dough in one big batch and scoop out dough straight from the bowl to the waffle iron when a fresh baked waffle is desired. We recommend that you treat the dough as you would ice cream, scooping what you need at the time you receive an order. Keeping the dough as one large batch helps maintain a more consistent dough temperature. Sub-dividing dough into smaller sized balls causes the butter within to melt quicker and creates an undesirable drippy texture.
      
      💡 You don’t need to subdivide the dough into dough balls. Always scoop dough straight to a hot waffle iron.
      
      
   5. At the end of the day, take the second batch of dough out of the freezer and place it into the fridge to thaw overnight for Tuesday use. On Tuesday morning, repeat steps 3 and 4 as before. This becomes essentially a repeating cycle where we move the dough from freezer to fridge the night before usage until we reach our last batch of dough. On Sunday, we prepare our next master batch of dough for the following week (starting at step 1 again).

Freezing Liege Waffle Dough

When freezing Liege waffle dough, the most important thing to remember is keeping pearl sugar out of the dough. You should mix the pearl sugar only into the dough on the day of baking (where you can use a mixer or fold it in by hand depending on batch size). There are two important reasons for this:

1. Yeast feeds on sugar and converts sugar into energy during the fermentation process. If mistakenly added to the dough, this process allows the yeast to break down the sugar pearls until it’s fully dissolved and will no longer create the satisfying caramelized taste of masterfully baked Liege waffles. The goal is to caramelize the pearl sugar during the baking process to create the luscious taste that makes Belgian Liege waffles so special. This is also why we steer our clients away from buying frozen Liege waffle dough balls, baking up a subpar waffle experience for your customers.
   
   
2. It’s essential to keep yeast relatively inactive while in the freezer. The pearl sugar fuels the yeast more than it needs to for the reason explained above. Over fermentation can cause a yeasty aroma to your dough and alter the taste of your Liege waffles.

💡 Don’t integrate any pearl sugar into your dough batch if you intend to freeze it. Add the pearl sugar on the day of baking.

Frozen dough should ideally be kept at 0°F (or -18°C) in the freezer. When the product is ready to use, it is best to thaw frozen dough overnight in a refrigerator and then bake accordingly.

Refrigerate Liege Waffle Dough

You can refrigerate dough for up to 24 hours. The reason for this rather short period is due to temperature, as refrigerators aren’t cold enough to keep the yeast fully inactive. Any period longer than this will cause yeast to over ferment, altering the dough’s taste. The golden rule is to keep dough in the freezer until you’re ready to bake within 24 hours.

💡 You can refrigerate Liege waffle dough for up to 24 hours. For any longer storage period use the freezer.

Blast Freezing: The Long Term Freezing of Liege Waffle Dough

Long term freezing of Liege waffle dough is typically more involved and often only relevant for industrial use. It involves a slightly different dough formulation using dough improvers followed by blast freezing the dough. It is critical to keep the dough temperature below 62°F (or 17°C) to maintain minimum yeast activity prior to dividing, molding, and freezing the dough. Professional bakers choose to use deactivated yeast or a delayed salt method to reduce mixing time and as a result ensure better control of dough temperature. An optimum long term frozen dough production is a well balance between ingredients, control of preparation process, and blast freezing.

Parbake and Reheat Liege Waffle

Partially baking (parbaking) and reheating waffles at a later time is a popular cooking technique amongst commercial bakers and food business owners as it eases daily operations significantly. Parbaking is particularly advantageous in high volume environments where one aims to cut down on preparation and cooking time.

To parbake, simply pre-bake Liege waffles for 2 minutes using a commercial grade cast iron waffle maker at approximately 365°F. Once partially baked, set the waffles aside and allow them to cool. In a cooled state, we recommended storing parbaked waffles in an air tight container until you are ready to reheat them. You can store the container with the waffles in it on the countertop if you intend to use it the same day, otherwise, store them in the fridge for up to 2-3 days. Once the customer orders the waffle, place the parbaked waffle back into the iron and reheat for the remaining 1 ½ minutes at 365°F.

Parbaking ultimately cuts down your preparation time nearly in half and creates a result that is arguably indistinguishable from a freshly baked waffle. Another option is reheating waffles in a countertop conveyer oven if that’s preferred, but keep in mind that customers will likely appreciate the use of a waffle iron for authenticity.

Packaged Waffles To-Go

Many of our business customers ask us about prepackaged waffles or waffles to go in a donut-style box. If this is of interest to you, we recommend that you par bake the waffles for 3 minutes and ask the customer to reheat in a toaster at home for 30 seconds before enjoying them. The extension of the parbaking time to 3 minutes allows the dough to bake more thoroughly in case the customer decides to consume them as is. Should the customer decide to reheat them in a toaster for 30 seconds, this provides wiggle room for the waffles to be reheated without getting too toasted or burned.