Waffles around the world
455 waffle recipes in 7 languages: English 238, French 67, German 60, Dutch 32, Portuguese 30, Spanish 18 and Italian 10. Each is reduced to grams per 100 g of flour, the same as everywhere in the lab, so a French page and an American one line up. English, the largest group, is the one the others are compared with.
The language is the page's, not the cook's country: a French page may be from Quebec, a Portuguese one from Brazil, a Dutch one from Belgium. Each language's lines are read in its own words and units, and a recipe that gives “a pinch” of salt counts a pinch.
Where they part from English
The clearest differences for each language, medians per 100 g of flour. Only differences large enough to matter and unlikely to be chance are listed (how below).
- Italian 10 recipesItalian recipes use about twice as much sugar as English ones (33% against 14% of the flour weight), 47% less leavening (2.6% against 5%) and under a third as much salt (0.2% against 1.2%).
- French 67 recipesFrench recipes use about half as much leavening as English ones (2.2% against 5% of the flour weight) and under a third as much salt (0.2% against 1.2%).
- German 60 recipesGerman recipes use 36% less liquid than English ones (103% against 163% of the flour weight), 45% more fat (48% against 33%) and 39% less leavening (3% against 5%).
- Dutch 32 recipesDutch recipes use 33% less liquid than English ones (108% against 163% of the flour weight), 30% less leavening (3.5% against 5%) and under a third as much salt (0.2% against 1.2%).
- Spanish 18 recipesSpanish recipes use 25% more egg than English ones (50% against 40% of the flour weight) and under a third as much salt (0.3% against 1.2%).
- Portuguese 30 recipesPortuguese recipes use 30% less fat than English ones (23% against 33% of the flour weight).
Every ingredient, language by language
Grams per 100 g of flour. One row a language, largest first.
middle half, and the median (the number at right; when most use none, the share that uses any)middle half of every recipesmall number after a name: recipes
The typical batch in each language
The median of each language's recipes for every ingredient, scaled to 250 g of flour. No single recipe is exactly this. Under each, the recipe nearest its language's medians.
English238
- Flour
- 250 g
- Liquid
- 405 g
- Egg
- 100 g
- Fat
- 80 g
- Sugar
- 35 g
- Leavening
- 12 g
- Salt
- 3 g
French67
- Flour
- 250 g
- Liquid
- 360 g
- Egg
- 105 g
- Fat
- 70 g
- Sugar
- 36 g
- Leavening
- 6 g
- Salt
- 0.5 g
German60
- Flour
- 250 g
- Liquid
- 260 g
- Egg
- 125 g
- Fat
- 120 g
- Sugar
- 65 g
- Leavening
- 8 g
- Salt
- 0.5 g
Dutch32
- Flour
- 250 g
- Liquid
- 270 g
- Egg
- 100 g
- Fat
- 70 g
- Sugar
- 35 g
- Leavening
- 9 g
- Salt
- 0.5 g
Portuguese30
- Flour
- 250 g
- Liquid
- 390 g
- Egg
- 100 g
- Fat
- 55 g
- Sugar
- 25 g
- Leavening
- 10 g
- Salt
- 3 g
Spanish18
- Flour
- 250 g
- Liquid
- 365 g
- Egg
- 125 g
- Fat
- 115 g
- Sugar
- 50 g
- Leavening
- 11 g
- Salt
- 0.5 g
Italian10
- Flour
- 250 g
- Liquid
- 265 g
- Egg
- 140 g
- Fat
- 85 g
- Sugar
- 85 g
- Leavening
- 7 g
- Salt
- 0.5 g
The medians and middle halves as a table
| Language | Liquid | Egg | Fat | Sugar | Leavening | Salt |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| English 238 | 163%139% to 194% | 40%36% to 50% | 33%23% to 43% | 14%7.8% to 20% | 5%3.7% to 6.3% | 1.2%0.6% to 1.7% |
| French 67 | 144%105% to 192% | 42%36% to 59% | 28%23% to 33% | 14%0% to 25% | 2.2%0.7% to 4% | 0.2%0% to 0.3% |
| German 60 | 103%79% to 139% | 50%40% to 68% | 48%30% to 50% | 26%16% to 36% | 3%1.8% to 4.1% | 0.1%0% to 0.2% |
| Dutch 32 | 108%103% to 146% | 40%26% to 53% | 28%21% to 40% | 14%5% to 26% | 3.5%2.5% to 4.6% | 0.2%0% to 0.7% |
| Portuguese 30 | 156%134% to 191% | 40%40% to 60% | 23%16% to 32% | 10%5.4% to 10% | 4.1%3.6% to 5.5% | 1.1%0.2% to 2.4% |
| Spanish 18 | 146%99% to 175% | 50%41% to 61% | 45%27% to 48% | 20%11% to 39% | 4.4%2.8% to 7% | 0.3%0% to 0.8% |
| Italian 10 | 106%103% to 139% | 56%43% to 73% | 34%23% to 48% | 33%26% to 43% | 2.6%2.4% to 3.7% | 0.2%0% to 0.3% |
How the comparison works
A language gets a row with at least 8 recipes. Each is compared with the English recipes on every ingredient, and a difference is listed only when it clears two bars: the medians sit at least a third of the middle half of all recipes apart (about half a standard deviation, a medium effect), and a rank test puts the gap at 3 standard errors or more, so a language with few recipes needs a large difference. For an ingredient many recipes skip, the share using none counts too: at least 25 points apart, at the same 3 standard errors.
Every ingredient is tested for every language, a few dozen tests per lab, which is why the bar is higher than the usual two standard errors. Salt is listed last when it differs: many recipes give it as a pinch or leave it to taste. Shares and “more than” percentages are rounded down, so none is an overstatement.
These are what recipe writers in each language do, not rules of each country's cooking. A language with 8 to 20 recipes may come mostly from a few sites; each recipe page names its source.