How to Make Beer Soft Pretzels - Homemade DIY Baking

Soft Pretzels and Beer!  A perfect pairing, going back to Bavaria and probably long before.  But the supermarket 'frozen' pretzels from the store taste terrible.  To go with a nice homebrew you need fresh, homemade pretzels: and that's exactly what I'm going to show you how to make.

First, the ingredients:

• 1 cup water
• 2 tbs butter
• 1.5 cups flour (all purpose white)
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 tbs sugar
• yeast (1 packet or a 1/4 tbs)
• 5 tsp baking soda
• 4 more cups water

Here are the ingredients, all placed out on the counter.

Step 1: Add the yeast to a cup of warm water, and stir.  Let it sit while you gather and prepare the other ingredients.

Place your butter (2tbs) in a bowl and microwave it.  Let it melt.

Add the butter, 1 cup flour, salt, and sugar into a bowl and mix.  Slowly add the last .5 cups of flour (that's point-5, not 5) and keep mixing until you have a nice dough.

Cover and let sit for 20 minutes or longer.

You'll notice the dough has nearly doubled in size.  Flour a flat surface and dump out the dough.

Knead and fold in the dough, giving it a nice consistency.  See the photos below:

After about 5 minutes, flatten the dough and roll it out a little.

Divide the dough into strips.  Each strip will eventually become a pretzel  so as you can see here, I'll have 5 pretzels.  If you like soft pretzels thicker (or thinner pretzels), you can adjust accordingly.

Roll and twist with your hands, making the dough into long strands.  Some people braid the dough, for a fancy soft pretzel.  As you're about to see, I'm not that fancy, and can hardly shape the dough into a pretzel shape (that it still tastes the same, and looks a little more rustic).

Shape the dough into pretzels.  The official description of how to do this is to hold the ends, twist together, and then make two loops.  

Once you have the "shapes" or soft pretzels ready, you'll need to get the soda bath going.  Add 5 tsp of baking soda to 4 cups of water.  Bring the 4 cups of water to a small boil.  Take care not to use an aluminum pot, as the baking soda can react and cause a large spillover.

Using a spatula or bent spoon, dip each pretzel into the bath of water for about 20 seconds.

Lift out and place on a greased or oiled baking tray.

Do this with each pretzel.  The baking soda is what gives the soft pretzel it
s brown coloring and the crusty flavor.

Once on the pan/tray, add salt.

Preheat the oven to 475 degrees.  Put the tray in the oven and set a timer for 15 minutes (adjust this as needed, depending on the thickness of your pretzels.  You'll see them browning over time.

Enjoy with hot sauce or a cold beer!