Croiffles—croissants Pressed In A Waffle Iron—is Something We Can Get Behind
Bakery item mashups make headlines, because it stands to reason that the sum of the parts of two delicious foods (like croissant and doughnut) will not be greater than the whole cronut. Hence the dagel (doughnut/bagel), crolls (croissant/roll), even the donug (doughnut/nugget). And now the Godiva Cafe in New York's famed Penn Station brings us the croiffle.
It's sure fun to say: The croiffle involves smashing a buttery croissant in a waffle iron, but not before filling it with delicious sweet or savory fillings. The jealous Independent (stuck all the way across the pond from New York) reports that these fillings include milk and dark chocolate, three cheeses, bacon, egg and gouda and sausage. All sound delish in various combos. Like a panini maker, or the George Foreman Grill, the waffle iron then heats up the filling, making for a nicely gooey chocolate or cheese crunchy sandwich. (Sure, you sacrifice some of that naturally occurring lacy crispness by pressing on a croissant. But a compact buttery vehicle for sweet or savory fillings? Yes, please.)
These hybrids are almost a dime a dozen lately, but this one may have sticking powers. None of this should be a surprise to Daniel Shumski, author of waffle-iron cookbook Will It Waffle?, who enjoys putting things like mac-and-cheese and crab cakes in that appliance (Shumski coincidentally wrote about Montreal chocolate croissants for The Takeout). Turns out a waffle iron should be used for much more than just waffles. Crisp croissant sandwiches? Seems like a gimme.