I think the first time that I had one of these soft dough pretzels was when I went to New York a few years ago, and since then I have been a huge fan. Bread is always a good shout in my books, and these are one of my favourite variants. They remind me mostly of winter and Christmas time - partly because it was at Christmas that I was in New York and partly because I always have one every year at the Edinburgh German Christmas Market. (I think the small, more crisp-like ones are popular in the UK, and while those are delicious, and this these ones are the best of the two.) However, winter it is not and the kitchen was slightly warm yesterday so I decided to make some.
These are an absolute first attempt for me, and I have to say I'm pretty pleased with them. Although they aren't the prettiest (I need to work on my dough shaping skills), they tasted good. This recipe made 8, however they are already gone with my brother asking me when I'm making more - a clear success.
The recipe came from The Brown Eyed Baker, one of my personal favourite baking/cooking blogs - I didn't stick to the recipe entirely.
INGREDIENTS:
1 ½ cups of warm water
1 tablespoon granulated sugar
2 teaspoons salt
1 packet of yeast
4 ½ cups of plain flour
*4 tablespoons of melted, unsalted butter
10 cups of water
2/3 cups of bicarbonate of soda (I didn't have enough but it worked fine.)
1 egg yolk mixed with 1 tablespoon of water for egg wash
As much coarse sea salt and black pepper to cover with as you wish
*or 2oz, or 57g (I find tablespoons of butter so awkward to measure out.)
DIRECTIONS:
STEP 1: Put the warm water, sugar and salt in a large bowl together. Sprinkle over the yeast and leave for 5 minutes. (at this point it is supposed to foam – I didn’t really find this happened but after 2 attempts with no foam, I went ahead with it and it seemed to work anyway.)
STEP 2: Add the flour and melted butter and knead. It should be ready when it comes away from the side of the bowl but I think you can feel when it’s ready when you handle it. In order to do this I used a dough hook and it took around 5 minutes, however without the hook it would depend on your strength and kneading skills I imagine? Place in an oiled bowl and cover with clingfilm, and leave it somewhere warm for about an hour. (It should double in size.)
STEP 3: Preheat the oven to 230°C, and then line 2 baking trays with baking paper and lightly brush with oil. Then put the water and bicarbonate of water in a large pan and leave to reach boiling.
STEP 4: As the water is warming up, use this time to shape the dough. (Lightly oil your surface first.) I got 8 pretzels from this, and I weighed each piece of dough exactly (as I am a loser) – but just 8 similar portions would be fine. Roll each piece into a long rope and then twist into a pretzel shape. (Make a U and then fold over). Once they’ve been shaped put them on the trays.
STEP 5: (The fun part.) The water should be boiling at this point. Place each pretzel in the water - one at a time – for 30 seconds each. Then using a utensil that allows for the water to drain (I used a draining spoon, funnily enough) take them out and place on the tray. After this, brush them with the egg/water wash and sprinkle with salt and pepper. I added lots of pepper as I love it, but it’s really up to your own taste.
STEP 6: Bake in the oven for 12-14 minutes, until they are golden brown.
These are super good warm, but not hot as burning your tongue is not much fun at all.... trust me.
Until next time,
Zoe
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