Soft Pretzels
With a slightly crunchy and salty crust and an oh-so-soft inside, these made from scratch Soft Pretzels are incredibly delicious. They are perfect on their own but are even better filled with salted butter or made into a sandwich.
How can one resist a warm Soft Pretzel? In our house, no one can. As soon as they come out of the oven, the kids gather in the kitchen and want to eat one.
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Water and Baking Soda (or food-grade lye):
To give the pretzel its characteristic flavor and distinct brown color, it needs to be placed in a hot baking soda water bath (or placed directly into food-grade lye, however, since I used baking soda, I’m not going more into detail about food-grade lye; maybe in another post) for about 30 seconds before baking.
The alkaline water reacts with the starch on the surface of the dough by thickening it into a gel. The gel hardens into a shiny brown color during baking and gives the pretzel its characteristic flavor.
Pretzels History:
There are different stories about when lye was first used to give pretzels their distinct color and flavor—way back when pretzels used to be sweet and coated with a sugar glaze.
The most heard story is the one of baker Anton Nepomuk. In 1839, out of carelessness, he accidentally used a lye solution on his pretzels when he actually wanted to dip them into a sugary water glaze. The pretzels didn’t end up tasting sweet, but his customers loved the savory taste of the pretzels, and the rest is history.
Use good quality ingredients:
All-purpose flour: King Arthur is my go-to flour for any baking. This all-purpose flour is unbleached, strong enough for bread, and gentle enough for cakes and pastries.
Instant dry yeast: There is no need to mix this yeast with warm milk or water. Instead, you can directly mix it in with the dry ingredients. I don’t use any other yeast!
E Guete (Bon appétit)!! Don’t forget to share some pictures with me and tell me how you liked these Soft Pretzels. It would make my day if you tag @mirjamskitchenyodel on Instagram, share on Facebook or pin on Pinterest.
You might also like the following:
Drei Königskuchen – Three Kings Cake
Soft Pretzels
Ingredients
Dough
- 600 g All-purpose Flour
- 10 g Instant dry yeast
- 2 tsp Granulated sugar
- 2 tsp Salt
- 330 g Water
- 60 g Butter melted
Water bath
- 1 liter Water
- 100 g Baking soda
Decoration
- Coarse salt
Instructions
- Add all-purpose flour, salt, sugar, and instant dry yeast into the mixing bowl of a stand mixer and combine.
- Melt the butter and add it with the water to the wet ingredients. Knead it until you have a soft, smooth, and stretchy dough. The dough is ready if you can stretch it out super thin between your fingers without it tearing, and you can read a newspaper article through it. It’s called the newspaper trick.
- Form the dough into a ball, place it in a large mixing bowl and cover it up with a wet towel. Or I like to use these bowl covers, they are reusable, and the dough won’t stick to it. Let the dough rest for at least an hour or until it has doubled in size.
- Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
- Take the risen dough out of the bowl and weigh it into 10 100g dough pieces.
- Roll each dough piece into a long string. Take both ends of the string, cross and then twist them, and press the two ends into the bottom part of the pretzel. Place the pretzel on the prepared baking sheet.
- Once you have formed all the pretzels, place the dish into the refrigerator for about 20 minutes.
- Preheat the oven to 350°F or 180°C.
- Fill a large pot with 1 liter of water and add baking soda. Bring to a simmer.
- Take the chilled pretzels out of the fridge. Place one pretzel at a time into the simmering water. Let it simmer for about 30 seconds on each side. Then, with a skimmer, carefully take the pretzel out of the water and place it back onto the baking sheet.
- Drizzle some coarse salt over it. Repeat with all the pretzels and then bake them for about 25-30 minutes.
