Auntie Annie's Copycat Pretzels

I love Amish soft pretzels.  They are chief among comfort foods.  My mom has an Amish farmer's market close to her house in Maryland, where the Pennsylvania Dutch come and sell things from meat to pickles to my favorite, pretzels.  Every time I visit her I try and make time to visit the market.  Last time I brought a few of the pretzels home so I could savor their delicious flavor. They were gone all too soon, however.

Enter my search to find the recipe for those very same Amish pretzels.  I decided I would scour the Internet to hopefully find them.  I ran across many recipes but landed on one that looked particularly good.  The reviews were good so I decided to print it out.  Unfortunately I didn't save the link, as I just copied the recipe into a word document and printed it off. These pretzels, although not exactly as delicious as the authentic Amish ones, are still very, very good.

Also, I changed one small thing from the original, and I will note this in the recipe.

Auntie Annie's Copycat Pretzels

Dough Ingredients:

1 1/4 cups water (approximately 105 degrees F)
1 Tablespoon yeast

1/4 cup brown sugar
4 cups minus 2 Tablespoons all purpose flour*
2 Tablespoons vital wheat gluten


Dipping Solution - before cooking

1/2 cup baking soda dissolved in 3 cups hot water

Dipping - after cooking

melted butter - about 1/3 cup

Preheat oven to 500 degrees F.

Dissolve yeast in warm water.  Add sugar then flour and vital wheat gluten.  Mix well using the dough hook attachment on your mixer.  Mix until just combined.  Do not over-mix as this toughens the dough.  Let rise until doubled, at least 20 minutes.  (I let it rise about 40 minutes and the results were excellent.)

Once dough has doubled, cut sections off with kitchen shears and roll into ropes.  You can leave them in the rope form or shape them into pretzel shapes.  Dip the raw dough into the baking soda dipping solution and transfer to a well greased cookie sheet. (I used a baking stone, but I'm not sure I'd do this in the future.)  Sprinkle with pretzel salt.

Bake for 4-6 minutes or until golden brown.  Dip pretzel into melted butter

*Original recipe called for 2 cups bread flour and 2 cups all purpose flour