Try this Soft Pretzels Recipe, or contribute your own.
- Carbohydrate 600.000432761053 g
- Cholesterol 121.90294933 mg
- Fat 45.9929430394867 g
- Fiber 0.0353333333333333 g
- Protein 0.4965418927 g
- Saturated Fat 29.1264727186827 g
- Serving Size 1 1 recipe (3391g)
- Sodium 3923.88517993585 mg
- Sugar 599.96509942772 g
- Trans Fat 3.21955850990266 g
- Calories 2729 calories
Step-by-step
- Combine water, sugar and salt and yeast in the bowl of a stand mixer.
- Wait 5 minutes or until it starts to foam.
- Use dough hook attachment.
- Add the flour and butter and mix on low speed until combined.
- Change to medium speed and knead until the dough is smooth and pulls away from the side of the bowl(about 5 minutes).
- Place the dough in an oiled bowl, cover with towel and sit in a warm place for about an hour or until the dough has doubled in size.
- Preheat the oven to 450.
- Line 2 baking sheets pans with parchment paper and lightly spray with cooking spray or brush with vegetable oil.
- Bring the 10 cups of water and the baking soda to a boil in an large pan.
- Lightly oil your work surface and turn out the dough and divide into 8 pieces.
- Roll out each piece of dough into a 2 foot rope. Flip ends of the rope across each other and press onto the bottom of the U in order to form the shape of a pretzel. Place onto the baking sheets.
- Place the pretzels into the boiling water, 1 by 1, for 30 seconds.
- Place back on the baking sheet, brush the top of each pretzel with the egg wash and sprinkle with the pretzel salt.
- Bake 12-14 minutes or until golden brown.
- Transfer to a cooling rack.
Allowing the yeast mixture to foam for five minutes confirms microbial viability before heavy flour additions weigh down the bowl. Dough elasticity depends entirely on developing gluten strands during the five-minute medium-speed knead, which stops when the mass cleanly clears the mixing container walls. Skipping this gluten development yields a crumbly interior structure that lacks the necessary chew. Oil the work surface instead of flouring it to prevent unnecessary density increases in the dough ropes.
Submerging shaped dough in a boiling solution of ten cups water and two-thirds cup baking soda triggers the Maillard reaction. This alkaline bath raises surface pH dramatically, accelerating protein and sugar browning during the high-temperature bake at 450 degrees Fahrenheit. Without this specific chemical step, baked dough tastes like standard bread rather than a traditional pretzel. The thirty-second boil must remain strictly timed to prevent waterlogging the interior crumb.
Brushing the boiled dough with an egg yolk and water wash creates an adhesive layer for coarse salt crystals while promoting a glossy exterior sheen. Pretzel salt has larger grain sizes that resist dissolving under baking humidity compared to standard table salt. Baking sheets require parchment paper treated with cooking spray because alkaline surfaces bond aggressively to untreated metal. Pull the pans from the oven at twelve to fourteen minutes precisely when the crust turns deep mahogany.
Day-old pretzels lose their signature crust crispness as ambient moisture migrates into the starch matrix. Rehydrating stale batches with a brief water mist followed by a five-minute stint in a hot oven restores the textural contrast between exterior shell and soft interior.
