Pretzel Recipe

I found this pretzel recipe on another blog, Along the Way and since I'm visiting 20 blogs this week, I was afraid I'd forget where I saw the recipe. I really want to try it so I'm posting it here to remind me :-) Thanks Cindy

Pretzels

What You’ll Need:

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

Optional: 1/4 cup kosher salt

Optional: melted butter and cinnamon and sugar

What You’ll Do:

1. In a small bowl, dissolve yeast and 1 teaspoon sugar in warm water. Let stand until creamy, about 10 minutes.

2. 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.

3. Preheat oven to 450 degrees F (230 degrees C). In a large bowl, dissolve baking soda in hot water.

4. 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. We made most of ours into pretzel sticks.
 
5. Once you have shaped all the dough, dip each pretzel into the baking soda solution and place on a greased baking sheet. Optional: Sprinkle with kosher salt.
 
6. Bake in preheated oven for 8 minutes, until browned.


7. Optional: melt butter and dip pretzels in butter then in a mixture of cinnamon and sugar.