Rise up, pretzel!

Continuing the 'Tour of Dough Winter 2009" here we have pretzels which turned out to be more like 'knots'. Because I was too lazy to Google "How to Make the Pretzel Shape.", I just sort of winged it. Did not matter. They turned out so nicely! Perhaps on my next go. Served with some 'cheezy soup', (sorry no recipe).

I would not try making these pretzels without a nice, strong mixer, though. They dough is pretty stiff...

Just like the bagels, you boil these puppies, but, unlike the bagels, you don't have a specific amount of time that you boil them for- you just slide them in, they sink, and then you wait for them to rise up!! It's like magic, people! Oh, also adding the baking powder to the water is fun, too! It fizzes and bubbles like crazy. I am easily entertained, I guess!

Ooohh! And I got to use my new scale to divide the dough out so I'd have matchy pretzels instead of a hodge podge! Verrrrry nice!

Because the dough is sort of dry I had a hard time at first making the 'snakes' but I channeled my inner child and took myself back to my old PlayDoh days and it was fine. It also helped to take a break and lightly oil the baking sheets and preheat the oven while the dough rested under a damp tea towel. When I tried again the second time it was fine!

Soft Pretzels

I veganized the recipe by subbing Earth Balance for the butter and Silk vanilla soymilk for the milk. Also, I just baked these without any added salt and of course without the egg wash. They were still momentous.

I let them rise for an hour in a oven heated to 170 degrees, turned off, with a damp teatowel over the top of the bowl. Oh, and I didn't really let them rise a second time in their pretzel-shaped form.

Still reading "The Pacific" and started some non-fiction.