Baking with uZ: Pretzels

That homely smell of freshly baked breads is truly comforting. Warm out the oven, with lashings of butter and a freshly brewed pot of tea and we're singing. The pretzel recipe below is a Sunday staple in our home and in the world of warm baked goodness, really rises to the occasion. Excuse the pun.

Pretzel recipe:

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Ingredients:

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4 and 1/2 cups cake flour + 1 extra 1/2 cup as needed

1 and 1/2 packets dry yeast

5 Tblsp tightly packed brown sugar

2 cups lukewarm milk

2 tsp fine salt

4 Tblsp butter at room temperature 

5 Tblsp Baking Soda

3 cups hot (but not boiling) water

Course salt for sprinkling

Sesame seeds for sprinkling 

3 Tblsp Melted butter

Method 

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* Add the yeast to the warmed milk in a large mixing bowl and stir through. Let it stand for 5mins.

* Once its stars going frothy add the sugar and whisk gently.

* Once it starts going super frothy, add the melted butter, fine salt and 1 cup of flour. Mix well.

* Add the remaining flour, one cup at a time and knead gently for 10mins until the dough pulls away from the sides of the bowl and is 'springy'. Add some more flour if it's too sticky to work with. Just keep going, kneading as you need. 😜.

* Cover with cling film or a damp cloth and allow to rise in a warm area for a minimum of 1 hour.

* Preheat your oven to 200 °C

* Line 2 baking sheets with parchment/ baking paper.

* In a separate  bowl whisk the hot water and the baking soda.

* Roll out your dough onto a floured surface and roll into one large sausage like shape. Divide into 3rds and then divide each 3rd in half and again in half so you have 12 pieces of dough. Grab one piece and cover the rest with plastic/ cloth.

* Now roll out you dough ball into a sausage shape. Start at the middle and just roll, stretch, roll until it's about 50cm long. It's easier to do this on a not-too floury surface so you have some grip.

* To make a pretzel shape: you can either keep it in the air, swing and flip and tuck or you can just try your best to get a 🥨 sorta pretzelish shape.

* Now carefully picking it up submerge the pretzel into the baking soda/ water mix and allow excess water to drip off. 

* carefully place on the baking sheet and adjust the shape and even it out a bit. Sprinkle with course salt or sesame seeds.

* Bake for 6-8mins until golden and puffy.

* I used 2 oven trays and baked it in batches of 6.

* Remove from.the oven, brush with melted butter and serve hot!