Soft Pretzels

Oktoberfest may have already come and gone, but to most Americans, they think it's still going through the rest of the month.  So to those of you who keep on partying and don't know why, I salute you.  Why not make some pretzels to celebrate someone else's recently passed holiday?

These pretzels were delicious, rivaling any mall store or ballpark pretzels.  As long as you have a couple of concepts understood, you can make your own delicious version of this at home.  I got the recipe from the show Good Eats by Alton Brown, and followed it to the letter.  I will only add more detail when we get to the part about the dough, which I think is important for success.

Also, you don't have to make pretzel shapes with this dough.  I stupidly forgot to take a picture, but with this dough I made 4 large, 4 small, and 4 pretzel rolls, which made for excellent sausage sandwiches.  Just shape them into ovals, let them rise in a towel, and then treat them as you would a pretzel-shaped version.

These went great with my spicy german mustard recipe, which will be an evolving page with updates as I tinker even more to get this exactly the way I want it.

Homemade Soft Pretzels

Recipe courtesy Alton Brown, 2007

• 1 1/2 cups warm (110 to 115 degrees F) water
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 2 teaspoons kosher salt
• 1 package active dry yeast
• 22 ounces all-purpose flour, approximately 4 1/2 cups
• 2 ounces unsalted butter, melted
• Vegetable oil, for pan
• 10 cups water
• 2/3 cup baking soda
• 1 large egg yolk beaten with 1 tablespoon water
• Pretzel salt

Combine the water, sugar and kosher salt in the bowl of a stand mixer and sprinkle the yeast on top. Allow to sit for 5 minutes or until the mixture begins to foam. Add the flour and butter and, using the dough hook attachment, mix on low speed until well combined. Change to medium speed and knead until the dough is smooth and pulls away from the side of the bowl, approximately 4 to 5 minutes. Remove the dough from the bowl, clean the bowl and then oil it well with vegetable oil. Return the dough to the bowl, cover with plastic wrap and sit in a warm place for approximately 50 to 55 minutes or until the dough has doubled in size.

Here's an important point - you'll get the best, fastest performance out of your yeast if you can find a nice HUMID place to put the dough, not just warm.  I forget where I picked up this trick, but I like to make a small "proofing" chamber out of a plastic tote I bought at the megamart, and put the dough bowl inside along with a small container (at least a pint) of boiling water.  This creates the unbelievable rising effect seen in these photos, which I kid you not are taken only 90 minutes apart, which actually had risen too much.

Note the size of the dough ball before rising.  Also note that there are no shear marks on the surface of this - it's fairly smooth, having been well kneaded until it was elastic and just slightly tacky

My proofing box - dough + boiling / steamy water = awesome.

This is what you would like to see, although maybe this was in there a bit too long

While the dough is rising, start preheating the oven to 450 degrees F. Line 2 half-sheet pans with parchment paper and lightly brush with the vegetable oil. Set aside.

Bring the 10 cups of water and the baking soda to a rolling boil in an 8-quart saucepan or roasting pan.

In the meantime, turn the dough out onto a slightly oiled work surface and divide into 8 equal pieces (definitely consider doing 16 pieces instead, the 8 pretzels this makes are just way too huge). Roll out each piece of dough into a 24-inch rope. Make a U-shape with the rope, holding the ends of the rope, cross them over each other and press onto the bottom of the U in order to form the shape of a pretzel. Place onto the parchment-lined half sheet pan.

Start with a nice long rope.  I had to roll it as shown to get an even diameter all down the length

I asked a German baker about the trick here, and he said "just bring the two ends up and let it come together".  That didn't really work, but I got it after a few tries.

It helps to look at a store pretzel while doing this.  You basically cross the tips over twice, and then press in slightly where the dough rejoins or crosses itself.

Place the pretzels into the boiling water, 1 by 1, for 30 seconds. Remove them from the water using a large flat spatula. Return to the half sheet pan, brush the top of each pretzel with the beaten egg yolk and water mixture and sprinkle with the pretzel salt. Bake until dark golden brown in color, approximately 12 to 14 minutes. Transfer to a cooling rack for at least 5 minutes before serving.

Before the bath, wash, and bake

Taking the first bath, before a quick rinse with some egg yolk and a sprinkle of sea salt

The final product!