Talk:Chicken and waffles

Intro

Should the intro really list the restaurants that serve this as their main dish? This dish is not limited to being served in places that have it as a specialty or main dish. I think the intro should be about the dish alone, not restaurants that serve it. Preston A. Vickrey (humbly) (talk) 23:47, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

Origin

There was a food network episode that interviewed the owner of the "first" restaurant to serve these. The origin they gave isn't listed here, but it was that in the 1920s in Harlem (where they originated), some people would had spent the night partying at Jazz Clubs go to restaurants at midnight and eat supper while others ate breakfast, so the restaurant in question started to serve them together. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.91.28.221 (talk) 01:12, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

To be honest, this article reads more like an advertisement for Roscoe's than a Wikipedia entry. And for what it's worth, growing up in PA, I'm more familiar with the Pennsylvania Dutch-style version, as opposed to this fried chicken version that's supposedly "more popular." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.187.134.112 (talk) 12:28, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

And the chicken is simmered in the gravy before being ladled on top of the waffle (a scoop of mashed potatoes with gravy is the garnish). Nitpyck (talk) 05:16, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

Why is Rush Limbaugh mentioned? It is interesting, but important to article? 69.224.42.174 (talk) 18:44, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

If it was invented in Harlem, then the words "Soul Food" and "Southern African American Tradition" are really out of place here. For what it's worth, I've been African American all my life... my Carolinian grandmother cooked me countless traditional dishes growing up in the 1970s and 1980s. But I never once saw Chicken and Waffles until the late 1990s in a restaurant. It is a purely commercial construct, and a recent one at that.

These arguments seem correct to me, showing the origin of fried chicken and waffles is 20th century. And the documentation for the version in the article now is poor. I encourage someone to make the changes. Colin McLarty (talk) 18:06, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

Ingredients

The description of chicken and waffles mentioned in this article is incomplete. Virtually every chicken and waffles recipe I've ever seen includes: waffle, chicken, butter, maple syrup and hot sauce. Nowhere in this article is hot sauce mentioned as part of the dish, but it's essential. That's how Roscoe's does it. That's how Lo-Lo's does it. Why is it not mentioned here? It's like not mentioning the sauce they put on buffalo wings.

Sentence doesn't make sense

This sentence in the article makes no sense: " Larry White has catered to the Arizona Cardinals and was flown down to Super Bowl XLIII in 2009 in Tampa to continue the tradition of cooking chicken and waffles for the team before winning games." Really? They serve it BEFORE winning games? There must be a better explanation here, such as "The Arizona Cardinals won XX consecutive games when Larry White catered to them prior to playing on gameday. So White was flown to(not flown 'down' ... flying down means you're flying into a hole in the ground) Super Bowl XLIII in 2009 in Tampa...

Restaurants

After going through all the references in the section, I removed it. Most of it was unsourced, most of the sources were poor, and the few sources that might be considered reliable were specific to individual cities. Basically, the section was a coatrack to promote non-notable restaurants. --Ronz (talk) 03:02, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Moved from article - Wells Supper Club

I don't think that their having a trademark, filed in 1986, is very relevant to this article. The only reference I was able to access was the first via http://tarr.uspto.gov/tarr?regser=registration&entry=1431599&action=Request+Status --Ronz (talk) 17:43, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Wells Supper Club

A restaurant named the Wells Supper Club in Harlem (1938–1999) used the slogan "Wells: Home of Chicken and Waffles, Since 1938".

A commonly quoted story is that the Wells Supper Club started selling the chicken and waffles dish to late-night patrons of their club in 1938 "as it was too late for dinner, and too early for breakfast"; so Wells Supper Club served both dishes on the one plate.

Proposed split

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

I just made a bold revision to try to accommodate the fact that this article is essentially about two different dishes with similar ingredients. But given that soul food C&W and Pennsylvania Dutch C&W have different histories and occupy different social spheres, is there any merit to splitting the article to deal with them separately? Given that the soul food version is better known at present, perhaps the Pennsylvania Dutch version should be split off, as in:

• Chicken and waffles
• Chicken and waffles (Pennsylvania Dutch dish)

Or both could get new pages, with Chicken and waffles serving as a disambiguation page:

• Chicken and waffles (soul food dish)
• Chicken and waffles (Pennsylvania Dutch dish)

Thoughts? Ibadibam (talk) 23:56, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

There is just one sentence concerning the Pennsylvania Dutch dish. If there were enough for a full-article, then a split would be fine, but as it stands right now, it would not be wise to split them. Madman (talk) 14:17, 19 February 2013 (UTC)

I agree there isn't much to split, we should keep it as is. JayJay^{What did I do?} 04:00, 28 February 2013 (UTC)

Don't split. Just maintain the two types under individual subheadings indicating the variations.168.179.217.75 (talk) 17:50, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

BennysHomeCooked.com

Web of Trust (a website reliability/safety ratings network) flagged this domain as not trustworthy. After clicking through to the site, I confirmed that it is indeed a clickspam/redirect site. It redirected me to Century 21, a real estate search engine. As I've never contributed to a Wikipedia article before, I'll leave any changes to the article itself in more experienced hands, but I just wanted to bring the issue up. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.44.6.119 (talk) 11:59, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

I wasn't able to find a copy of the source online, so I just removed the link and left it as a print citation. Ibadibam (talk) 03:01, 20 February 2013 (UTC)

As a breakfast food

We're going to need stronger sources than this one if we're going to include this as a breakfast food. The author says that the food's origins as a breakfast dish are "a bit dubious" and cites only a single restaurant critic as the origin of this claim. The author gives equal weight to a claim that the dish originated as an improvised snack following cannabis consumption. Let's find a better source than this. Ibadibam (talk) 17:36, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

Chips

Can we have a section on the Lay's chips? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.193.171.69 (talk) 23:38, 15 April 2013 (UTC)

Good idea. How can we approach this in a non-recentist way that doesn't turn into an advertisement for Frito-Lay? Ibadibam (talk) 23:46, 15 April 2013 (UTC)

Dickie Wells' Chicken and Waffles

I'm having trouble finding a good source. harlemworldmag.com seems to be best. --Ronz (talk) 20:49, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

• http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:mpr0fMRRQVYJ:harlemworldmag.com/2012/07/06/playboy-dickie-wells-the-most-popular-man-in-harlem/+&cd=2&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a Playboy Dickie Wells, “the most popular man in Harlem” July 6, 2012. Harlem World Magazine.
• http://www.atdf.org/awards/laurence.html

The owner was Richard “Dickie” Wells (1907-1949) of the dance group "Wells, Mordecai and Taylor" --Ronz (talk) 20:54, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

The Harlem World article seems strong enough, although it would be nice if we could find a source for the name of the club. The ATDF page gives passing mention to Wells and his club but not to the dish, so it's not going to be helpful for this article. Ibadibam (talk) 21:01, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

The club's name was simply "Dickie Wells" from what I can find. --Ronz (talk) 21:11, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

• http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:prI7rYDNuVoJ:harlemworldmag.com/2013/07/15/harlems-dickie-wells-chicken-and-waffles-restaurant-1940s/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a Harlem’s Dickie Wells Chicken And Waffles Restaurant, 1940′s July 15, 2013. Harlem World Magazine. --Ronz (talk) 21:17, 14 August 2013 (UTC)
• http://www.harlemonestop.com/news/128/harlem-demolished-the-home-to-wells --Ronz (talk) 21:20, 14 August 2013 (UTC)
• http://www.tias.com/102/PictPage/1921372182.html has pictures of the menu. "Harlem's Unusual Night Club" 169 West 133rd Street, NY. TIllinghast 5-8495" "Chinese and American Dishes" I assume the menu item "Southern Fried Chicken" included waffles. --Ronz (talk) 21:36, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

Think we can also integrate the old passage about the "Wells Supper Club" from the above section? Ibadibam (talk) 21:32, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

I'm not clear what you're referring to. --Ronz (talk) 21:37, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

This: Talk:Chicken and waffles#Moved from article - Wells Supper Club. Do you think the content presented in that section is well-sourced enough to be reintroduced to the article? Ibadibam (talk) 21:40, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

Oh, good catch! I'm still trying to make out the history of the place... It's not crystal clear that this is the same place. --Ronz (talk) 21:50, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

It seems to be the same restaurant, new location. --Ronz (talk) 22:04, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

• http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2013/02/14/172019116/fried-chicken-and-waffles-the-dish-the-south-denied-as-its-own Aha! Here's a nice source, though they spelled it "Well's." I'm finding the mistake to be common, along with attributing the club to Dicky Wells. --Ronz (talk) 21:49, 14 August 2013 (UTC)
• http://www.nytimes.com/1984/12/02/nyregion/harlem-hot-spot-to-try-a-comeback.html --Ronz (talk) 21:49, 14 August 2013 (UTC)
• http://www.pbs.org/food/the-history-kitchen/history-chicken-and-waffles/ Another good source! --Ronz (talk) 22:04, 14 August 2013 (UTC)
• http://theuptowner.org/2009/12/11/wells-plan-to-take-wings-and-waffles-nationwide-hits-setbacks/ Includes details on the history and moves. --Ronz (talk) 22:06, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

The Harlem World piece pictures a club named "Dickie Wells", while the NY Times article indicates the founder is one Joseph T. Wells. It seems like the two places are completely different. Is it possible that Harlem World mixed the two up, and that it was only the Wells Supper Club, and not the Dickie Wells club, that served C&W? Or perhaps both did? Ibadibam (talk) 22:28, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

I think you're right. Dickie Wells' was originally a place called The Nest. ( http://nypress.com/the-rise-fall-of-the-original-swing-street/ ) --Ronz (talk) 22:54, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

I notice that that NY Press article also mentions Tillie Fripp's club as a popular source of chicken and waffles. Interesting. Ibadibam (talk) 23:05, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

And Tillie's pre-dates both of them, but I doubt we'll verify who served it first or when. --Ronz (talk) 23:16, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

• Heirs to Dirty Linen and Harlem Ghosts: Whitewashing Prohibition with Black Soap By Theda Palmer Saxton Ph D http://books.google.com/books?id=wB_sijB5rT0C - has a great deal about Tillie and her restaurants. It suggests that Tillie's was serving chicken and waffles before they moved to a new location in 1935. The author is co-owner of Bill's Place, which was previously Tillie's. --Ronz (talk) 20:22, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

Has some great info on Tillie, although the single reference to chicken and waffles is from the same New York Age source that the NY Press quotes. The book also discusses Tillie innovating with some other dishes, like "porker-crackle-berry-combination" (97). The book covers her in depth, and indicates she got some pretty good coverage in the press of that day. I think we have A) enough material for an article on Tillie Fripp and B) sufficient sources to document that she was a pretty important person with respect to chicken and waffles. Here's another article that mentions her in connection to the food. Ibadibam (talk) 20:39, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

So what do we include in the article?

Trying to start summarizing what we've found in the above: We've sources for three different restaurants in Harlem during the 20's or 30's, all within a block of each other. While "Wells Supper Club"/"Wells Restaurant" was the latecomer of the three, it's the best documented. --Ronz (talk) 17:14, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

Best documented because of its recent relaunch, no doubt. All three have sources backing them, so let's try to get all three in there. Maybe the paragraph should be about chicken and waffles being a part of the Harlem jazz scene in general, and give these clubs as examples? Ibadibam (talk) 19:32, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

regional vs. transregional

Hi, Ibadibam! By transregional I think you mean that it has popped up independently in multiple regions? My thinking on the category was that a dish that had started in a single area and had subsequently become popular in other areas was still appropriate for inclusion. For instance, New York-style pizza. It's a regional dish that has become popular in other places for whatever reason. Let's discuss? valereee (talk) 18:41, 13 July 2015 (UTC)

Hi Valereee! This article covers a dish that developed, presumably independently, in two different traditions: Pennsylvania Dutch cuisine and Harlem soul food. The latter is now common throughout the United States. So I wouldn't call this any more regional than a hot dog, which, despite having a known place of origin, has since outgrown it. Also, while soul food draws heavily on the cuisine of the American South, it's more closely identified with an ethnic/racial culture than a region. Given that c&w actually appears to have originated in New York, with Southern influences, it's hard to pin it on a particular region. I also have some questions about the category itself, which we can discuss in the CfD. Ibadibam (talk) 00:52, 16 July 2015 (UTC)

Okay, I couldn't get to all of your references -- the first one broke, the patent office just took me to their home page -- but II do see your point about a dish that has become so ubiquitous that we can no longer call it regional - hamburgers, hot dogs, etc., -- but there are two dishes on this page, one of which would possibly fit into that category (although I'd argue that the fried chicken with butter and syrup on a waffle is still regional in that it's generally presented as regional specialty, often with an explanation actually on the menu (pretty sure I can find sourcing for that) and the second of which would definitely fit into the category of clearly regional dishes. I would have probably argued above that we have two different dishes here, and that saying any dish that included chicken and waffles had to go into the same article would be like saying a loose meat sandwich was a version of a hamburger. But I can live with it, since they are both clearly described as being different. My primary interest here is navigational. I believe there is a strong possibility that I'm not the only person using Wikipedia who would like an easy way to learn more about American regional dishes (or regional dishes of the United States, which I chose because of the whole '"America" includes nearly as many countries as does "Africa" argument). Re: the cat itself -- we don't need to argue it here, but FTR I personally believe per WP:CLN that using both navigational aids in an article is helpful, because I suspect lists tend to be used by less experienced users and categories by more experienced users. valereee (talk) 11:32, 17 July 2015 (UTC)

(Those refs are actually part of another discussion and I've moved them to reduce the confusion.) There are indeed two topics in this article, which makes it an inelegant kind of set index. I actually initiated a split (see above), which failed to achieve consensus. Were Cuisine of the Pennsylvania Dutch a more comprehensive article, we might merge the relevant content there and let this article cover only the soul food dish. If you can find a reliable source that demonstrates that chicken and waffles is local to a particular region, please add it to the article. Ronz did a pretty good job finding Internet sources that demonstrate that c&w as we know it is a New York dish that has entered the broader soul food tradition, which itself is a culinary creole of the Black American experience. Ibadibam (talk) 19:38, 17 July 2015 (UTC)

History of waffles

I am challenging Edge's history of fried chicken as a reliable source on the history of waffles, particularly this passage:

One such theory is that waffles entered American cuisine in the 1790s after Thomas Jefferson’s purchase of a waffle iron from France. Fried chicken was a common breakfast meat, and serving "a breakfast bread with whatever meat [was available] comes out of the rural tradition."

Waffles existed in America among German and Dutch immigrants at least a century before Thomas Jefferson purchased a waffle iron, and the association with fried chicken is pure conjecture on Edge's part. I think the source is probably a good survey of the state of modern fried chicken, but it seems to be a bit short on historiological rigor. Ibadibam (talk) 21:50, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

Trivia survey

Quick survey of popular-culture mentions heretofore added to article, with my assessment (mostly OR, so not worth putting in the article itself, but we can present the evidence and let the readers draw their own conclusions, when appropriate):

1. Fanny Herself, Edna Ferber, 1917: mentions a Chicago diner falsely advertising "Southern chicken dinner with waffles and real maple syrup, 35 cents each."
   • Predates Harlem nightclubs that served the dish
   • Suggests the dish had spread outside its Pennsylvania origins.
   • May indicate the dish is too luxurious to offer regularly
   • Establishes early Southern association with dish
   • Earliest known fictional reference to the dish. Worthy of mention.
2. "Chicken and Waffles", Bunny Berigan, jazz instrumental
   • Establishes an association with jazz scene (e.g. Wells Supper Club), albeit by a White composer
   • Maybe worthy of mention
3. Mildred Pierce, James M. Cain, 1941: a White woman opens a series of restaurants in Glendale, California, serving fried "chicken-and-waffle dinners". Book contains several passages discussing finer points of the dish's preparation.
   • Early mention of the dish in L.A. area
   • No one in the book appears to treat the dish as a novel combination.
   • Maybe worthy of mention
4. Tapeheads, 1988, includes a fictional hip-hop commercial for Roscoe's
   • Use of hip-hop may indicate association with African-American culture, but white mascot whitewashes the real restaurant.
   • The first of a slew of references to Roscoe's (est. 1975), serving more to establish Hollywood setting than say anything about the dish itself. Not worthy of mention in this article, but probably in Roscoe's.
5. Swingers, 1996: Roscoe's is mentioned as a late-night spot
   • Reinforces dish as a late-night food.
   • Mainly just a Los Angeles cultural reference. Not worthy of mention.
6. Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo: a fictional chicken and waffles place in Holland is full of Black people. An African-American character says assuming he'd be there is racist. He also says the Dutch invented the dish. The restaurant's logo is similar to Roscoe's.
   • Reinforces association with African-American culture, to the point of stereotype.
   • The claim of Dutch origin is probably meant as a joke, but isn't far off from the actual origins among Low German speakers in Pennsylvania.
   • First reference that indicates strong association with African-Americans, but in itself not worthy of mention
7. Black Dynamite: offers a tongue-in-cheek origin story for Roscoe's
   • Reinforces association with African-American culture
   • Just another Roscoe's reference. Not worthy of mention.
8. Archer: title character frequently requests the dish when drunk.
   • Reinforces dish as late-night food.
   • Not worthy of mention

Per WP:IPCV, we're really only supposed to include these sorts of mentions when they are significant enough to be covered in secondary sources, and then only when the reference is illustrative or noteworthy. I can work on finding a few sources. In some cases, it might work better integrating them into the "History" section than having a standalone IPC section. Ibadibam (talk) 17:50, 3 January 2018 (UTC)