Ingredients
For the Pretzels
- 250 g strong white bread flour
- 90 ml milk, lukewarm
- 60 ml water, lukewarm
- 3/4 tsp brown sugar, or malt extract
- 1 1/4 tsp instant yeast, or active dry yeast
- 1 1/2 tbsp unsalted butter, melted
- 1 tsp table salt
For Serving
- Rock salt
- Melted butter
For the Pretzel Bath
- Large Pan
- 1 litre water
- 3 tbsp baking soda
Method
Step 1
To start add brown sugar to the lukewarm milk and water mixture. You'll want to stir this together until the sugar is dissolved.
Step 2
Drop the yeast on the top of the liquid and leave for 5 mins. The yeast should start to sink and after 5 mins there should be some bubbles appearing.
Step 3
While you're waiting for bubbles to appear, melt the butter over low heat or with a few short blasts in the microwave.
Step 4
Pour your bubbly yeast water into a bowl and add the flour, butter and salt to the mix and bring that into a dough using your hands or a dough whisk.
Step 5
Knead the dough for around 5 mins or until the dough feels nice and smooth. When kneading you'll be able to feel the change in the texture.
Step 6
Leave this to prove for 1 hour in a warm place, during this time it should have doubled in size.
Step 7
Knock the dough back with a couple of kneads and then section the dough into 4 equal-sized pieces.
Step 8
Make them into pretzel shapes and place on a tray. I've made a handy visual guide for how to shape pretzels .
Step 9
Leave them on the tray, to rise for 30mins without anything covering them.
They need to start to form a bit of skin on them so leaving them somewhere with a bit of moving air can help this like a window or a door. If not, you can leave them for a little longer than 30 mins until that skin appears.
Step 10
Time to Preheat the oven to 200 degrees / 180 fan / Gas Mark 6
Step 11
We now need to create our water bath with the water and baking soda. Mix the boxing soda in and bring this to the boil.
Step 12
Dip the pretzels in the water for no more than 5 seconds and add them straight onto some parchment paper and sprinkle some rock salt on top of them.
Step 13
Bake the pretzels for 15mins or until they become that typical golden brown colour that you know of.
When they are ready, leave them to cool down on a wire rack and brush on a little bit of melted butter and a few more sprinkles of salt to make them really shine
