Pretzels

[UnicornHaze]

hi, I am new to this forum, I joined because I want to learn how to bake. I need help making a specific pretzel and I hope some one can help me find the recipe or explain to me what ingredients will make this type pretzel . I use to work in a little German bakery when I was 14 and it closed down 15 years ago. I've been searching since then for a pretzel like they made and I've had no luck. All the pretzel recipes I have found are all basically the same and just taste like bread. The one I'm looking for is dark on the outside and inside it's very airy and light weight (not at all thick and dense like the typical kind) and soft (almost melts in your mouth, but also chewy when you try to bit a peace off (you kinda have to tug on it). Please help I would greatly appreciate it!

 

[Norcalbaker59]

hi, I am new to this forum, I joined because I want to learn how to bake. I need help making a specific pretzel and I hope some one can help me find the recipe or explain to me what ingredients will make this type pretzel . I use to work in a little German bakery when I was 14 and it closed down 15 years ago. I've been searching since then for a pretzel like they made and I've had no luck. All the pretzel recipes I have found are all basically the same and just taste like bread. The one I'm looking for is dark on the outside and inside it's very airy and light weight (not at all thick and dense like the typical kind) and soft (almost melts in your mouth, but also chewy when you try to bit a peace off (you kinda have to tug on it). Please help I would greatly appreciate it!

Recipes on the internet and in cookbooks are going to be formulated for the homebaker, so they will not contain additives commercial bakers use to improve doughs . Commercial bakers routinely use dough conditions and emulsifiers like mono and diglycerides and sodium stearoyl lactylate to improve texture and increase shelf-life. In the case of pretzels (laugenbrezel), the crust gets an added boost in color and texture by dipping in a lye solution.

Commercial bakers also use proofers to control the humidity and temperature of dough while it rises. You can create a better environment to rise/proof dough by using your oven. Leave the oven off; placing a shallow pan on the oven floor. Then fill it with a couple on inches of boiling water. Shut the door an allow the steam to warm the oven. More is not better. Too much steam will make your dough soggy. You just want a bit of humidity and a ambient temperature of about 85° Fahrenheit.

While you cannot readily purchase dough conditions, you can use a lye treatment. Try googling “laugenbrezel lye treatment” to find a more authentic recipe that uses a lye dip. But keep in mind, the lye dip won’t improve the inner dough taste or structure. The lye treatment enchannces the Millard reaction (fancy term for browning) by changing the Ph level. Also, lye is a hazardous substance—research proper handling and safety practices before you use it.

 

[Norcalbaker59]

I was trying to think of a good alternative to lye. Many pretzel recipes use baking soda. But plain baking soda is much too weak an alkaline to produce the crust a pretzel is noted for. But baked baking soda might work. In Asian cooking, lye is used to create that wonderful spring in ramen. The Japanese use a lye solution called kansui. But it’s not readily available to home cooks. So baked baking soda is used instead. It creates an almost identical texture to ramen as the kansui.

I’m not sure if baked baking soda will produce the exact type of crust on a pretzel as a lye solution, but it should be a better crust than a plain baking soda dip.

To bake baking soda, spread it over a foil covered baking sheet and bake in 250° oven for an hour to hour fifteen minutes. Since it’s now concentrated, be careful not to touch it with bare hands. Store it in an air tight container. You’ll need to bake more baking soda than the recipe calls for as it will reduce during baking.

Edit: I was curious about using baked baking soda for pretzels so I googled it. Looks like it’s a method used and promoted by a few sources. Cooks Illustrated has a photo of pretzels showing the difference between using plain and baked baking soda. While baked baking soda doesn’t produce a crust as rich in color as lye, it’s a lot better than plain baking soda. Cooks Illustrated states baking the baking soda for two hours. So since they actually made pretzels with this method, I’d say bake it two hours rather than one.

https://www.cooksillustrated.com/how_tos/6399-professional-quality-soft-pretzels-at-home