Homemade Soft Pretzels

I wanted to make my oldest daughter's teacher a "Thank You" gift for a great 1st six weeks of school.  She listed her favorite afternoon snack as being pretzels.  So I thought I would give homemade pretzels a try.  I've been working with homemade dough lately and love a culinary challenge.  I tried a freshly baked hot pretzel and they were really good.  I hope that Madison's teacher enjoyed them!  I only made a few changes to the original recipe.

Ingredients:

4 tsp active dry yeast
1 t white sugar
1 1/4 cup warm water (110 degrees)
4 cups flour (maybe more)
1/2 cup white sugar
1 1/2 tsp kosher salt
1 T vegetable oil

1/2 cup baking soda
4 cups hot water

Egg
1 T water
Kosher salt

Directions:

In a large bowl, add the yeast, 1 tsp sugar, and warm water.  Stir and let stand until creamy, about 10 minutes.

Add the flour, sugar, salt, and vegetable oil to the yeast mixture.  Stir with a spoon until it comes together.  You might need to add more flour until it's no longer sticky.

Turn out dough onto a floured work surface.  Kneed dough until smooth, about 8 minutes.

Wash your large bowl from earlier, dry, and coat with vegetable oil.

Form dough into ball, put into oiled bowl, and cover with towel.  Place bowl in oven and let rise until doubled in size, about 1 hour.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.  Spray 2 non-stick baking sheets with Pam cooking spray.

In a deep skillet, dissolve baking soda and hot water.  Turn heat on low and let mixture come to a simmer.

Turn risen dough out onto a lightly floured work surface.  Shape into a square using your hands.  Use a pizza cutter to cut into 10 equal strips. 

Roll each piece into a rope and twist into a pretzel shape.  This video helped me figure out how to form the pretzel shape:  http://www.monkeysee.com/play/9620-twisting-pretzels

Place each pretzel shape onto prepared baking sheets.  When all pretzels are shaped, dip each pretzel into the baking soda solution for 10 seconds each.  

Use a slotted flat spatula to remove them and place back on the baking sheet.

11.  Beat up egg with 1 T water for egg wash.  Brush each pretzel with egg wash and sprinkle generously with kosher salt.

12.  Bake in preheated oven for about 8 minutes until browned.  

Enjoy!

Recipe Source: All Recipes.