Ingredients:
- 4 teaspoons active dry yeast
- 1 teaspoon white sugar
- 1 1/4 cups warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
- 5 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 cup white sugar
- 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
- 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
- 1/2 cup baking soda
- 4 cups hot water
- 1/4 cup kosher salt, for topping
- In a small bowl, dissolve yeast and 1 teaspoon sugar in warm water. Let stand until creamy, about 10 minutes.
- In a large bowl, mix together flour, 1/2 cup sugar, and salt. Make a well in the center; add the oil and yeast mixture. Mix and form into a dough. If the mixture is dry, add one or two tablespoons of water. Knead the dough until smooth, about 7 to 8 minutes. Lightly oil a large bowl, place the dough in the bowl and turn to coat with oil. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise in a warm place until doubled in size, about 1 hour.
- Preheat oven to 450 degrees F (230 degrees C).
- In a large bowl, dissolve baking soda in hot water.
- When risen, turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and divide into 12 equal pieces. Roll each piece into a rope and twist into a pretzel shape. Once all of the dough is all shaped, dip each pretzel into the baking soda solution and form on a greased baking sheet. (optional to spray with butter flavored cooking spray before you salt them) Sprinkle with kosher salt.
- Bake in preheated oven for until browned. *watch them closely the first couple of pans so you can figure out what works best for your oven.
TIPS:
We found it to be quite hard to keep a consistent size, color and smoothness to the pretzels we made for D's birthday (we made over 3 batches...so...many...pretzels!), but by the end we figured out what made the best out of all the batches.
Here's what we learned....
- Grease the pan!
- Use a rack that's up higher in the oven to prevent burning of the pretzels bottoms.
- The baking soda bath burns a black residue onto your pans...line with tinfoil for easy clean up.
- Do not dip the dough in the Baking Soda bath for longer than 10 seconds...they get too soggy and just don't turn out as well.
- A good way to divide the dough is by rolling it out in a long, flat rectangle with your rolling pin, then cut long strips with a knife.
- be sure to roll each strip with your hands so that it is rounded and not square like a few of ours turned out!
A lot of people tend to be puzzled about the dunking into a baking soda and water mixture....Simply put, without it, they won't have that wonderful golden brown color.
Just whatever you do, don't put it into the actual dough!
Hot Mustard Dip
- 1/4 cup ground mustard
- 1/4 cup vinegar
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 1 egg yolk
- 2 tablespoons honey
- In a small saucepan, combine mustard and vinegar; let stand for 30 minutes.
- Whisk in the sugar and egg yolk until smooth.
- Cook over medium heat, whisking constantly, until mixture just begins to simmer and is thickened, about 7 minutes.
- Remove from the heat; whisk in honey. Chill. Serve with pretzels. Store in the refrigerator.
Original recipe source: Butter Soft Pretzels
