Chicken and waffles

Lore & Background

Chicken and waffles, as a combined recipe using pulled boiled chicken, likely first appeared in the 19th century in Pennsylvania Dutch country, though no documented evidence supports a 1600s origin. The traditional Pennsylvania Dutch version consists of a plain waffle with pulled, stewed chicken on top, covered in gravy. A version using fried chicken is associated with the American South. The soul food version of chicken and waffles grew in popularity after the opening of the Wells Supper Club in Harlem, New York, in 1938. The waffle is served as it would be for breakfast, with condiments such as butter and syrup. This version of the dish

Reader's Guide

Chicken and waffles holds significance as a dish that bridges multiple American culinary traditions—Pennsylvania Dutch, Southern, and soul food—and has evolved over centuries. Its earliest recorded form, from the 1600s in Pennsylvania Dutch country, featured pulled boiled chicken on a plain waffle with gravy. By the 1860s, it was a common Sunday dish among the Pennsylvania Dutch, and by the end of the 19th century, it had become a symbol of Pennsylvania Dutch Country, partly due to tourism. The fried chicken version, associated with the American South, gained prominence through establishments like the Wells Supper Club in Harlem, opened in 1938, which helped popularize the soul food version. In Los Angeles, Roscoe's House of Chicken and Waffles, opened by former Harlem resident Herb Hudson since the 1970s, further spread the dish's fame, becoming a favorite of Hollywood celebrities and referenced in movies. The dish's legacy is marked by its adaptability and its role in African American culinary history, where it was considered a special-occasion meal for decades. Despite its long history, the exact origins remain unknown, and early Southern cookbooks from the 1870s and 1880s do not include recipes for the combination, suggesting a later origin for the dish in that region.

Did You Know?

• The traditional Pennsylvania Dutch version consists of a plain waffle with pulled, stewed chicken on top, covered in gravy.
• The soul food version of chicken and waffles grew in popularity after the opening of the Wells Supper Club in Harlem, New York, in 1938.
• A 1901 memoir recalled a tavern in the Pittsburgh neighborhood East Liberty known for 'suppers of spring chickens and waffles'.
• The combination of chicken and waffles does not appear in early Southern cookbooks such as Mrs. Porter’s Southern Cookery Book (1871) or What Mrs. Fisher Knows About Old Southern Cooking (1881).

Colonial Roots and the Pennsylvania Dutch Table

Chicken and waffles traces its earliest documented presence in America to the colonial era of the 1600s, when European settlers carried waffle-making traditions into Pennsylvania Dutch country. The original preparation was modest: a plain waffle topped with pulled, stewed chicken and a ladle of gravy. In the early 1800s, inns and resorts outside Philadelphia initially paired waffles with fried catfish, but as the seasonal scarcity of that fish became a practical problem, fried chicken gradually took its place as the preferred protein. By the 1860s, a plate of waffles smothered in chicken and gravy had settled into the weekly rhythm of Pennsylvania Dutch households as a customary Sunday meal. The dish's identity became so intertwined with the region that, by the close of the nineteenth century, it functioned as a culinary emblem of Pennsylvania Dutch Country, a status reinforced by the growing tourism industry that drew visitors to the area. A 1901 memoir even recalled a tavern in Pittsburgh's East Liberty neighborhood celebrated specifically for its spring-chicken-and-waffles suppers, illustrating how the dish had already spread well beyond its heartland.

Soul Food Heritage and the Harlem Supper Club Era

Although chicken and waffles were served as an extravagant breakfast in antebellum Southern plantation houses, the dish's most celebrated association in African American cuisine emerged from Harlem. In the 1930s, the neighborhood hosted several establishments that put the plate on the menu, including Tillie's Chicken Shack and Richard Wells' jazz nightclub, with the Wells Supper Club—opened in 1938—becoming the defining venue. The soul food presentation differs markedly from the Pennsylvania Dutch original: the waffle is treated as a breakfast item, accompanied by butter and syrup rather than gravy. A widely told origin story holds that, because chicken was a scarce luxury for many Black families in the South and waffles were less familiar than the flapjacks and pancakes they cooked regularly, the pairing felt like a true delicacy. For generations it remained a special-occasion meal within African American households. Notably, the combination is absent from early Southern cookbooks, including Mrs. Porter's 1871 volume and Abby Fisher's 1881 work, the latter widely regarded as the first cookbook authored by an African American, hinting that the dish's formal codification came considerably later.

From Taverns to Tin-Plate Ads: The Dish's Cultural Penetration

Long before it became a restaurant staple, chicken and waffles wove itself into American popular culture in surprising ways. Thomas Jefferson's 1789 purchase of four waffle irons in Amsterdam gave waffle-making a significant boost in the young republic. By the 1840s, the celebrated abolitionist couple Jeremy and Phoebe Warriner built their tavern's reputation in Springfield, Massachusetts, around broiled chicken and waffles. The dish also found its way into literature and advertising: a 1909 Griswold's waffle-iron advertisement promised home cooks they could host a chicken-and-waffle supper whenever the mood struck, and Edna Ferber's 1917 novel Fanny Herself referenced a Chicago eatery touting a Southern chicken dinner with waffles and real maple syrup. In 1935, jazz trumpeter Bunny Berigan composed an instrumental simply titled "Chicken and Waffles," embedding the dish in the musical landscape of the era. The pairing also crossed the country by the early 1930s, when The Maryland restaurant in Los Angeles marketed fried chicken and waffles as a Southern specialty, and James M. Cain's 1941 novel Mildred Pierce featured a Glendale woman building her career on a chicken-and-waffle dinner menu.

Hollywood, Baltimore, and the Modern Restaurant Scene

Since the 1970s, chicken and waffles has enjoyed a second wave of national attention driven largely by the Los Angeles food scene. Herb Hudson, a former Harlem resident, opened Roscoe's House of Chicken and Waffles, which quickly became a favorite haunt of Hollywood celebrities and earned references in multiple films. The restaurant's success spawned several offshoot locations, growing into a small chain that kept the dish firmly on Southern California menus. Meanwhile, in Baltimore, Maryland, the combination achieved a level of local popularity sufficient to be recognized as a regional custom, underscoring how the dish can become deeply embedded in a city's identity. Today, chicken and waffles occupies a unique position in American food culture: it simultaneously belongs to Pennsylvania Dutch heritage, Southern soul food traditions, and the broader landscape of specialty restaurants across the United States. The dish's journey from a colonial-era Sunday supper to a celebrated menu item in Harlem jazz clubs, Hollywood dining rooms, and Baltimore neighborhood spots illustrates its remarkable adaptability and enduring appeal across more than three centuries.

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