So I gave the belgian waffle iron a try today..... while the results weren't exactly great, they were promising enuff to warrant a couple of more attempts! They DID get nicely crunchy
and the most pleasing thing about them..... the little pockets where the spuds got compressed were SUPER crunchy while the open spaces were nice and FLUFFY! VERY nice texture to them.... I was expecting that it was going to be a miserable fail, but ended up enjoying the hell out of them. I wasn't able to get a nice 'waffle' --- it pretty much fell apart and had to be picked out of the waffle iron --- but I think with a little work and adjustment, it can be done.
Started with a medium sized spud (russet) - what I would consider a 'nice' portion of hash browns in the skillet - baked it for 20 minutes @ 400 and let it cool to shed. Heat up waffle iron - spread oil over iron with basting brush top and bottom (harder than it should be - spray may help, but may be messier) - put the shreds on the iron loosely stacked ~3/4" thick (didn't use all since I thought there was too much --- WRONG - I could have used them all and then some more) - close and squeeze shut. Wasn't sure how long it should take..... tried checking at 5-6 min (since I usually cook in the skillet for 7 per side) - not even close - let it go to 10 - still not there - ran it out to 15 and was gonna give up as a failure.... figured I'd start cleaning up the mess - pulled it out onto the plate to find that they were in fact nicely cooked, but falling apart.
Gonna try again tomorrow with more shreds (shoot for 1"+) and plan on letting it run out to 20-25 minutes - it seemed like the steam subsided at ~ 12 minute mark - realizing that they will probably take a LONG time to burn as long as there is still some steam coming out. Hoping that after a couple of uses the iron will get seasoned and make it easier since it hasn't been used in over 5 years. Still debating whether to season in the iron or not.... probably will.
A very worthwhile experiment that I assumed was a fail but ended up with some of the best hash browns I had in a while.... the texture was incredible! Cooked very uniformly top and bottom without any scorching or 'fossilized' sections. Feels good that I used only ~1/2 T of oil so thats a win too -- usually use 1+T in the skillet to keep from scorching.
Hopefully the iron will clean up easily.... realized that the reason it hasn't been used for so long. If it makes hash browns that good or better from here on, the waffle iron has a new lease on life....