Pretzel Bread

Pretzel Bread.

I know.

 

 

This was a Pinterest find.

Matt's darling cousin, Jenny, had it pinned and it looked really good. I remember in Utah eating pretzel rolls from Costco and how good they were. This bread looked just like those.

How hard could it be?

 

Not even a little bit hard.

 

Almost as easy as that peasant bread I make and it tastes so good.

 It's a giant, salty soft pretzel.

 

 

 Roe had a slice with some cream cheese spread on it and it was fantastic.

I put nasty Velveeta on some and I was in heaven.

I know Velveeta is the Kmart of all cheeses, but I still like it for some things.

 

The boys all just ate it plain and we ate both loaves by the time everyone went to bed last night.

 

Caleb- you want to make this.

 I did it all in my Kitchenaid and it was perfect. Abbie can make this bread, but know that if you have her help make it, you will have to share it with her.

The recipe says it is better warm, so let that be your excuse to eat it all the day you make it.

 

Link and recipe: ( I followed it exactly, turned out perfect)

 

http://www.seededatthetable.com/2013/03/07/sliced-pretzel-bread/

 

 

Sliced Pretzel Bread

Prep Time: 15 (active) 55 (inactive)

Cook Time: 20 minutes

Yield: 2 loaves

Serving Size: 2 slices

!

• 4 Tablespoons butter, melted
• 1 Tablespoon sugar
• 2 teaspoons kosher salt, plus more for topping
• 1 1/2 cups warm water (110 to 115 degrees F)
• 1 package (2 1/4 teaspoons) instant yeast
• 22 ounces (about 4 1/2 cups) all-purpose flour
• Vegetable oil (nonstick) spray, for pan and bowl
• 10 cups water
• 2/3 cups baking soda
• 1 large egg yolk, beaten with 1 Tablespoon water (for egg wash)

In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine the butter, sugar, salt and 1 1/2 cups warm water. Sprinkle the yeast on top. Add the flour and mix with the dough hook attachment on low speed. Once the dough comes together, increase the speed to medium and mix for another 4 to 5 minutes, until the dough is smooth and pulls away from the sides of the bowl. Remove the dough from the bowl, wipe the bowl and then spray with the vegetable oil. Return the dough to the bowl, turning once to cover both sides with the oil. Cover tightly with plastic wrap and let rise in a warm place for approximately 45-50 minutes, or until doubled in size.

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F and adjust the oven rack to the lower third of the oven. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper and lightly spray with vegetable oil; set aside. (Alternatively, you can use a silicone liner with no spray.)

Turn the dough out onto a slightly oiled work surface or pastry mat. Divide into two equal halves. Shape into loaves and place side by side onto the lined baking sheet. Cover lightly with a clean kitchen towel and let rest for 10 minutes.

Bring the 10 cups of water to a boil in a large sauce pan or stock pot, then add the baking soda.

Carefully place one loaf in the boiling water for 30 to 40 seconds, turning once. Use a large slotted spoon or spatula to remove from the water and return to the pan. Repeat with second loaf. Brush the top of each loaf with the egg wash then sprinkle with kosher salt. Use a sharp knife to score a shallow "X" on the top of each loaf.

Bake in the preheated oven until dark golden brown and the sound of tapping the loaf is hollow (approximately 20 to 25 minutes.) Allow to cool on a wire rack for at least 10 minutes before slicing and serving.

 

Notes

If you do not plan to consume the bread the same day, then I would suggest freezing immediately after they hit room temperature. The more fresh they are when you freeze them, the better. Throw them in a freezer bag and freeze up to 1 month. Reheat in the oven at 350 degrees for 5 to 10 minutes (until heated through). This is what I do, and they taste just as fresh!

 

 

Peasant Bread

 

I've seen this recipe make the rounds on Pinterest a lot lately.

No-Knead Peasant Bread.

 

 

No knead? I love to make bread, I am good at making bread, but I have just enough OCD that I hate hate hate having to get my hands all gunky to knead it. It's not so much my hands, but the gunk that gets under my fingernails and in my ring and.....

Wow, this post got gross all of a sudden.

Anyway, this was delicious.

It was crazy easy and had really good flavor. That might be due to the fact that it bakes in a pool of butter, but what's the point of baking if it doesn't involve butter?

Make it.

It's yummy.

 

 

Peasant Bread

4 C. flour

2 tsp. salt

2 C. lukewarm water

1 TB sugar

2 tsp (or 1 packet) yeast

1 stick margarine

 

In a small bowl, mix the sugar in the water until it dissolves, then add the yeast. Stir with a non metal spoon and let it sit until it's foamy- usually about 10 minutes.

 

In a larger bowl, sift together the flour and salt.

 

Once the yeast is all yeastified, add it to the flour and salt mixture and stir with a wooden spoon.

This will make a really wet and sticky dough.

Cover it with plastic and let it rise until doubled.

 

Once it has doubled, punch it down and get two bowls that can withstand baking. Pyrex is just perfect. Divide the margarine in half and grease your bowls generously with the butter and then just leave the rest of the stick of butter in the middle of the bottom of the bowl. If you don't want all of that butter, then only grease the bowl and skip the glob in the bottom, but know that I am sad for you.

 

Divide the punched down dough in half and put in the bowls.

You'll get messy unless you are more  OCD than I am and can manage to accomplish this with a couple of forks like the woman on Pinterest did.

I about dropped dough on the floor when I tried, so I just used my hands. It's still super sticky and wet dough.

That's okay.

Cover and let it rise until double again.

 

A good rule of thumb when having bread rise- always rise until double that first time, don't rush this by not letting it actually double. The second rise tends to take half as long as the first rise. I have a knack for having my bread rise annoyingly slow, so even if the recipe says rise for an hour or until doubled-- wait until it is doubled. I have had that 'hour' take 3 hours before, and I never regret just letting it take as long as it needs to take.

 

Anyway----once it's doubled again- bake the bread in a preheated 425 oven for 10 minutes, then turn the oven to 375 and bake for 22-25 more minutes.

 

When you take it out, smother butter on the top.

It should slide right out of the bowl and you will see how it soaked up all of that heart clogging butter from the bottom.

You will think to yourself "I love Chris. I love her so much."

 

And if it doesn't turn out....then blame Pinterest.

 

Baking...Like a Boss

I cannot express how much I love this new season.

They call it "fall" here.

(Not my picture, but one of our town )

It's amazing.

I know you have autumn in Utah, but to tell the truth.....not like this.

I grew up in Arizona. There is not such thing as Autumn/Fall. It's too hot to wear long sleeves when you go Trick or Treating and sometime in November, it's finally not like living on the surface of the sun. You might even need a sweatshirt for the months of December -February. There are no piles of leaves to jump in and your jack-o-lantern starts to rot if you carve it more than a week before Halloween.

Don't get me wrong, it was great to be a teenager in the land that heavy winter coats forgot. 

When I moved to Utah, I was delighted to have Spring and Fall.

Seasons!

However, those seasons are what I referred to as Sybil Time. You'd start off the morning freezing, by noon it would be so hot you considered just leaving that coat you wore in the morning by the side of the road, it was too hot to even carry the stupid thing. Sometimes it would freeze early and ruin your garden and just as you were pulling out the sweaters and accepting the cold weather, it would be 85 degrees again for a few weeks.

The weather in Salt Lake had multiple personalities most of the time. 

Summer, Winter and "Mother Nature has a hangover, so she'll just put on whatever looks clean."

Here, we've had this GROSS humid summer.  It's awful. Cooking is terrible because even the crock pot makes the whole house seem to heat up. I used my oven as little as possible and every time I did, we paid the price. Our electric bill was insane. It was way worse than any bill I'd had in the worst Arizona summers. we were all dehydrated and the summer weather was a huge shock to our bodies and we had a lot of migraines and stink.

Then, September came and slowly the weather has been cooling down. One morning there was a crisp breeze and it practically smelled like Autumn. I was expecting it to be a fluke, but every day it's just a little bit cooler and the air feels a little more clean and the leaves are slowly changing color. In Utah, you have window of about 1-3 weeks where the leaves all turn and you make sure to load up the kids and drive to the mountains if you want to see all of that "autumn" stuff in nature- at least, that's how we experienced it. 

The house is pleasant. The weather outside is amazing. Cool enough to wear jeans now, but they don't become denim sauna pants by late afternoon. It's comfortable and I can cook now without my whole house going into shock.

I promised Zane I'd make pumpkin roll. It's his favorite dessert I make and I don't blame him. It's as addictive as crack. Sweet pumpkin and cream cheese flavored crack.

I made one today, but it looks bad. I used the wrong pan, so the cake was too thin and even though it tastes like orange heaven, it looks like an orange poo.

So I'll post a picture of one that another person baked.

Someone who cooled it the right way and used the right pan and who sifts her powdered sugar so it doesn't look like clumps of carpet fresh.

The recipe I use is the one you find on the inside of the can of Libby's Pumpkin. If you haven't made this- DO IT. Everyone you share it with will want to kiss you after they are done licking the filling off their fingers and singing songs of praise. It's so good.

I also made a new recipe today.

We're having pasta for dinner tonight and since I was feeling extra bake-y I made bread sticks.

They were so easy and they are super good.

I got the recipe from the Worldwide Ward Cookbook, Mom's Best Recipes.

The think that makes these amazing is that they are quick and simple and you cook them in a pool of butter.

I know!

Buttery Bread Sticks

1T Yeast

1 1/2 C warm water

2 T sugar

1/2 t. salt

3 C flour

1/2 C butter

---

Preheat the oven to 350.

 Take your stick of butter and put it on a shallow baking sheet and pop it in the oven until it melts.

put yeast, sugar and water in a bowl and let it do it's thing for about 5 minutes.

In a large bowl, mix flour & salt, then add yeast mixture.

knead until it's firm and elastic. I just did it all with the dough hook in my mixer, it worked great. I think I let it run about 5 minutes. The recipe says hand knead for 10. 

Whatever floats your boat.

Let the dough rest and raise for about 10 minutes, then divide it into 12 balls- roll and shape like bread sticks.

Take your bread stick snakes and roll them in the melted butter in the pan.

I sprinkled garlic powder on mine, if we had Parmesan cheese in the house I would have used some of that, too.

Let the sticks rise in the pan of buttery goodness for 15-20 minutes.

Then brush on some more of the butter, just to make sure it's going to make your heart stop beating for sure.

Bake for 15-18 minutes.

Pinch yourself that they were that easy and they are so freaking good. 

Olive Garden has nothing on these, I'm telling you.

 It's my new favorite roll recipe.

The bottom is soaked with butter and has a light flaky crust on it, but they are very soft.(

 I turned one upside down so you could get an idea of how much butter those babies soaked up, but it looks burned in the picture. It's not burned, just too much of whatever Instagram effect I used/)

They took about an hour start to finish. It makes 12 bread

sticks, but I can't count so I only made 8. The story I'm telling the family is that it only made 7 though because I was hungry, Yo.

There I go again with the "Yo."

That's my cue to stop typing and eat some pumpkin roll.