Soft Pretzels

The Complete Baking Book for Young Chefs

Soft pretzels are one of my favorite street foods. We went to an amusement park recently and I ate two of them in one day (I did share at least one of those!) The standard recipe has you boil them before baking, much like a bagel, which can be a little difficult. This one is aimed at younger cooks and so reduces the risk of burning yourself by using a baking soda wash instead, which worked out pretty well for us.

You can find the full recipe on the ATK website here: https://www.americastestkitchen.com/kids/recipes/soft-pretzels

Captions

[00:00]: foreign
[00:06]: hello and welcome to cooking the books
[00:08]: with Heather today we're going to be
[00:09]: working again well not again actually
[00:11]: this is the first first for this book
[00:13]: but we're going to be working with my my
[00:15]: mini Chef here uh my son who is eight by
[00:19]: the way and we're going to be working
[00:21]: from the complete baking book for young
[00:24]: chefs uh it's a America's Test Kitchen
[00:27]: cookbook and it's pretty good for kids
[00:30]: and in fact
[00:32]: um we've cooked from this a little bit
[00:33]: before already and we like it and we
[00:36]: cook from another book do I have it here
[00:40]: right here the first recipe we made with
[00:44]: this little guy was uh not so little guy
[00:47]: was from the mine Crafters cookbook but
[00:49]: we're using a different cookbook this
[00:51]: time these are two books that
[00:53]: he has that we like
[00:56]: um we've got another one too but we
[00:57]: haven't
[00:59]: got another America's Test Kitchen book
[01:01]: but we haven't uh done any of that on
[01:03]: this show yet we'll see but he's been
[01:05]: wanting to make soft pretzels and
[01:08]: there's a recipe in here
[01:11]: um so that's what we're gonna be doing
[01:13]: are you ready yeah all right
[01:16]: so what do we do first we
[01:19]: for the dough in a bowl of standard
[01:23]: mixer whisked together flour yeast and
[01:26]: kosher salt all right so we've got our
[01:28]: stand mixer and we've got our dough
[01:30]: attachment on here already because
[01:32]: that's what we're gonna need but first
[01:35]: a little stuff out of our Bowl
[01:39]: um we're going to combine those
[01:41]: ingredients with just a whisk which
[01:43]: we're going to use again first so what
[01:46]: do we put in here flour this is bread
[01:49]: flour which we measured by weight but we
[01:53]: measured this by weight instead of by
[01:55]: volume so salt and and so this is kosher
[02:00]: salt
[02:04]: this is my standard diamond crystal
[02:05]: kosher salt let me have that and then
[02:08]: that is a yeast
[02:11]: it calls for Rapid rise or instant or
[02:15]: rapid Rises that's right and so this is
[02:18]: whatever we had which is what we use all
[02:20]: the time I think it's instant I'm not
[02:22]: sure and we're gonna whisk that mm-hmm
[02:36]: that's good enough
[02:39]: all right
[02:40]: so I'm gonna go ahead and put this on
[02:43]: here because I think that's what we're
[02:44]: going to need that for next but what do
[02:47]: we do next
[02:51]: uh in
[02:53]: in Fork up Liquid measuring cup I've got
[02:56]: that right here
[02:58]: whisk together oil brown sugar and water
[03:02]: until brown sugar has dissolved all
[03:05]: right so we have our water here that
[03:07]: we've measured and it is room
[03:10]: temperature so you want it you know a
[03:11]: little on the warm side definitely not
[03:14]: cold I've got that in there then we put
[03:17]: this in here the brown sugar
[03:21]: put it up which we have already
[03:24]: um it measures for uh what was it again
[03:30]: packed so packed brown sugar that's what
[03:32]: you usually do with brown sugar and I'm
[03:34]: going to measure out this just because
[03:35]: it's a really large bottle we needed a
[03:38]: little bit of vegetable oil which I use
[03:42]: um
[03:44]: grape seed oil generally and we mixed it
[03:47]: together yep and you whisk it and we're
[03:49]: using the Whisk
[03:53]: tail
[03:55]: so the good thing about this is we only
[03:57]: have to use one whisk because we whisk
[03:60]: the dry ingredients first and then we
[04:01]: can just whisk to the wet ingredients
[04:03]: using the same whisk
[04:13]: is it pretty good and now what do we do
[04:20]: mix until but uh start mix start mixer
[04:27]: on low speed and slowly pour water
[04:29]: mixture mix until not until no dry flour
[04:34]: is noticeable about two minutes increase
[04:37]: speed to medium or knee and knee dough
[04:40]: for eight minutes stop mixer all right
[04:43]: so excuse the pup outside she's probably
[04:47]: barking at a paper so we're going to
[04:48]: turn it on low which on our says stir
[04:51]: and then you're gonna slowly add that
[04:54]: oh okay
[05:05]: yeah there are some different
[05:06]: ingredients we need after the pretzels
[05:09]: are all shaped and everything but we
[05:11]: don't need that right now so we're not
[05:12]: gonna bother talking about that right
[05:14]: this minute
[05:22]: [Music]
[05:23]: thank you
[05:27]: we could
[05:31]: sort of get all that all into a ball
[05:34]: with our hands a little bit if we're a
[05:36]: little concerned
[05:38]: what do you think uh good
[05:40]: all right I also like to do dough so I'm
[05:43]: also good with that now here's a here's
[05:46]: a tip when you when you are kneading
[05:49]: dough in a mixer you really want to lock
[05:51]: it because otherwise it can go flying
[05:58]: so that was our eight minute timer so
[06:02]: now oh look
[06:04]: it all came cleanly off of the dough
[06:07]: hook that's nice and take this off how
[06:09]: many balls do we have in there about two
[06:11]: about two balls in there we're gonna
[06:13]: take this off
[06:16]: let's go just leave that right there
[06:19]: and move
[06:20]: the mixer out of our way now we take
[06:23]: this now transfer dough to clean counter
[06:27]: and use your hands to knead dough for 30
[06:29]: seconds then form go and just into a
[06:33]: smooth ball see photos
[06:36]: 61.
[06:43]: okay
[06:46]: [Music]
[06:48]: all right your hands are clean right
[06:52]: and like I said
[06:54]: I
[06:56]: have dealt
[06:58]: with dough he and his dad think make
[07:01]: bread together quite a bit
[07:04]: he's the helper
[07:06]: he's the one who likes to cook
[07:09]: my sister
[07:11]: does not
[07:17]: know
[07:19]: how to let go you need to let it go
[07:24]: if there are any bread Masters
[07:28]: telling me how to need this is how I
[07:32]: remember
[07:39]: trying to roast me
[07:43]: foreign
[07:47]: so
[07:49]: thank you
[07:50]: use your the healing your foot pan to
[07:53]: push it away from you ah like that
[07:56]: because we're trying to
[07:58]: develop the gluten and get
[08:01]: it takes a lot to need all right
[08:17]: and then it says turn it into a ball
[08:24]: a little bit
[08:26]: so it's about 30 seconds so I don't know
[08:31]: there we go that's pretty good why you
[08:35]: have to develop the gluten
[08:37]: well that's what makes bread chewy
[08:41]: but what if you don't want chewy bread
[08:43]: what are you
[08:44]: want nice and just bite through and
[08:49]: Dom on it like um a hard pretzel
[08:57]: thank you
[08:58]: all right so you can let's let's see let
[09:01]: me show you
[09:04]: can do it like that and that'll help get
[09:08]: push this together
[09:10]: make it more now you're making it look
[09:12]: like a Chinese food
[09:14]: but then you
[09:18]: roll it like that see and then you fix
[09:22]: the cracks that your mother made
[09:26]: whatever
[09:27]: so this is just the first step it
[09:29]: doesn't really matter what it looks like
[09:31]: right now we're just making it a little
[09:32]: ball
[09:34]: um so in the recipe they tell you to
[09:36]: spray this with non-cook non-stick
[09:40]: cooking spray we don't keep that in the
[09:42]: house so I just put a little bit of our
[09:44]: vegetable oil in here
[09:47]: basically does the same thing yeah and
[09:50]: we're just using a
[09:55]: pastry brush to make sure our bowl is
[09:59]: covered this will keep the dough from
[10:02]: sticking
[10:03]: the bowl there we go
[10:09]: and now we have our ball it's fine it's
[10:11]: fine it's fine I don't want any cracks
[10:13]: my pretzels
[10:15]: we got a lot to do after this so we're
[10:18]: gonna put this in our Bowl in our bowl
[10:20]: and we're gonna cover this with plastic
[10:23]: wrap and we're gonna
[10:25]: we don't need it right this second we
[10:27]: don't have to show them dude
[10:28]: we're gonna cover this with plastic wrap
[10:30]: and we have to let it sit
[10:33]: in a warm place not too warm until it is
[10:38]: doubled until it's twice this size and
[10:41]: how long does that say uh one and a half
[10:45]: hours an hour to an hour and a half
[10:47]: right so we will see you when this is
[10:51]: doubled and let you know how long it
[10:52]: takes
[10:53]: okay so uh
[10:55]: our dough is ready it's been a little
[10:58]: over two hours at this point it's kind
[10:60]: of cool in here but got some bubbles
[11:02]: going on
[11:03]: we're definitely doubled in size
[11:06]: we've turned the oven on and it's heated
[11:08]: to
[11:12]: 425
[11:13]: rack in the middle
[11:15]: and we've prepared a baking tray with
[11:19]: foil foil vegetable oil and a baking
[11:23]: sheet right and we put a put this rack
[11:26]: on it and since we don't have the
[11:29]: vegetable oil spray stuff we just uh use
[11:32]: our brush and some space for oil I'm
[11:36]: going to put this to the side for now
[11:39]: and we don't get this right this second
[11:42]: what do we do with this let's see uh-huh
[11:45]: so we need
[11:48]: some water how much that
[11:52]: we need in a small microwave safe Bowl
[11:57]: we need normally pretzels are boiled
[12:00]: before you bake them kind of like a
[12:03]: bagel in a solution usually with lye as
[12:07]: far as I can tell food grade lie
[12:10]: um we're not doing that you can also
[12:12]: boil them with a baking soda solution
[12:15]: instead we're going to paint them with
[12:19]: baking soda but what we're going to do
[12:21]: now is pour it water into the bacon
[12:24]: combine the water and baking soda into a
[12:27]: microwave safe bowl that is just
[12:30]: a little something
[12:32]: there
[12:33]: that out there
[12:35]: it is almost too much but we're going to
[12:39]: um
[12:39]: put this in the heat it in the microwave
[12:42]: until
[12:44]: it uh for one to two minutes until it's
[12:47]: clear until the baking soda is all
[12:48]: dissolved we're going to put this on our
[12:50]: on our clean counter and then I'm going
[12:53]: to pop the bubbles and yes you can pop
[12:56]: the bubbles
[12:59]: crap and we're supposed to Pat and
[13:02]: stretch it into a six inch square all
[13:06]: right
[13:07]: so
[13:09]: we're gonna keep our plastic wrap
[13:11]: because we're gonna need it in a little
[13:13]: bit
[13:16]: pop all right
[13:18]: let's pull it apart well that's the only
[13:21]: way so
[13:23]: I want to do this we're trying to make a
[13:26]: square can we can you make a square
[13:30]: six inch squares so six inch square is
[13:33]: kind of
[13:37]: yeah kind of like that both directions
[13:39]: so we need this kind of
[13:41]: just pull it apart and squish it that
[13:43]: way and then round it now well make it
[13:50]: [Music]
[13:53]: that's sort of a square
[13:57]: don't matter and then we roll it until
[14:00]: We're Not Gonna Roll this is six inches
[14:03]: we're just patting it into a six inch
[14:04]: square this is approximately
[14:08]: six inches
[14:10]: my hand from here to here is about six
[14:12]: inches so that's a good
[14:14]: we're supposed to cut this into six
[14:17]: equal one inch wide strips so I'm trying
[14:21]: to make sure that we're kind of equal
[14:24]: no no part is too thick or too thin so
[14:28]: that all of our strips will be pretty
[14:30]: much the same and these make six
[14:34]: pretzels six pretzels so we're cutting
[14:37]: this into six strips so you want to cut
[14:41]: it in half put it in half first
[14:44]: I don't know
[14:55]: [Music]
[15:09]: what we're cutting it
[15:11]: into about half see uh-huh and then and
[15:14]: then we cut these pieces into three
[15:16]: uh-huh
[15:19]: we're making six
[15:27]: I'm not throwing behind you
[15:31]: like that
[15:32]: how about I do parallel lines
[15:38]: you can do that like that
[15:43]: I swear you know what pair though is
[15:46]: yes like breadstick parallel
[15:50]: all right
[15:51]: I'm holding a weapon mister
[16:03]: brush it down until it cuts all right
[16:11]: I can't
[16:13]: make parallel lines
[16:16]: okay one of them's gonna be very small
[16:20]: oh don't worry we'll give that one to
[16:22]: truffle
[16:26]: all right so we're gonna cut a little
[16:28]: bit off of this one
[16:30]: just got extra
[16:33]: sure can I eat that no
[16:37]: we're trying to make this one a normal
[16:38]: size one oh my goodness
[16:41]: okay so we're gonna
[16:43]: put these over here
[16:46]: so now we're gonna cover the ones we're
[16:49]: not working with with the plastic wrap
[16:51]: just so they don't dry out
[16:53]: and this one we're gonna work yes so
[16:56]: what I have done
[16:58]: is measured 22 inches and from this side
[17:02]: to this side of the tape I put little
[17:04]: tape markers down
[17:06]: so that I know how long my pretzel needs
[17:08]: to be so we're supposed to
[17:11]: roll this into a 22 inch
[17:16]: rope don't worry it kind of
[17:20]: it will
[17:21]: uh shrink back a little bit too so you
[17:24]: don't have to worry about it if you get
[17:26]: a little bit too long
[17:28]: all right
[17:30]: this is there almost there
[17:33]: and
[17:35]: hey we're trying to make it in the
[17:37]: picture relatively a ruler they used a
[17:41]: ruler and I I used you know a measuring
[17:43]: tape to measure this and now
[17:46]: and now I get to do this part
[17:50]: I'm gonna do this part do you want me to
[17:51]: do the first one and then you can do the
[17:53]: rest no yes no I should do the first one
[17:56]: show you my mistakes now well let me
[17:60]: I've done it before I've made pretzels
[18:02]: one other time before
[18:06]: that was like 20 days ago
[18:10]: for Stella
[18:11]: there was still a bubble in that anyway
[18:14]: so
[18:16]: make it a a u facing away from you
[18:21]: and then twist it pull this up and you
[18:24]: twist it
[18:25]: twice
[18:27]: and then you pull it down you pull it
[18:31]: down and
[18:33]: press them in together so there is one
[18:38]: pretzel my turn and now I think I put it
[18:43]: on the baking sheet on on our baking
[18:46]: sheet
[18:47]: [Music]
[19:01]: push it in there this one's gonna be a
[19:04]: bit lopsided and you can
[19:07]: [Music]
[19:13]: foreign
[19:17]: [Music]
[19:23]: so now we have our water and baking soda
[19:26]: mixture that kind of overflowed boiled
[19:28]: over in the microwave but that's okay
[19:30]: it'll come up pretty well with just a
[19:32]: wet cloth that we're going to use
[19:36]: a
[19:38]: pastry brush and paint the tops and
[19:43]: sides
[19:44]: with this anything left over you don't
[19:48]: need to keep
[19:49]: but uh so you can paint them pretty
[19:52]: liberally this will help them get that
[19:54]: really Brown
[19:56]: um shine shine do you want to I was
[19:59]: gonna let you do smart Tucson so ours
[20:01]: are a little different summer that one's
[20:03]: pretty small and
[20:06]: anyway that'll be fine they'll still
[20:08]: taste delicious
[20:10]: doesn't what matter what it looks like
[20:13]: it matters what it tastes like
[20:23]: but you still want to have good plating
[20:25]: if you're a master chef
[20:27]: [Music]
[20:38]: and then were you gonna sprinkle almost
[20:39]: yep and now we have a little bit of
[20:42]: pretzel salt
[20:44]: um we don't like all too much of this
[20:46]: salt but
[20:48]: um
[20:48]: you want to sprinkle it you just want to
[20:50]: sprinkle that we've measured it out
[20:55]: but it will stick on it because it's
[20:57]: kind of damp now because we painted it
[20:59]: with the water mixture
[21:15]: last ones we made were a bit over salted
[21:18]: they they did end it up a little end up
[21:20]: a little over salted but I think we used
[21:22]: more salt than this even on those ones
[21:24]: so
[21:27]: I will let's see let me just make sure
[21:30]: we have
[21:31]: a little bit of salt sort of everywhere
[21:35]: it does a lot of it falls off but oh
[21:38]: well
[21:40]: you know machines do it a lot better
[21:43]: yeah yeah yeah you keep saying that
[21:47]: so
[21:48]: these go in the oven for 10 to 12
[21:51]: minutes you want them to be very very
[21:53]: deep golden brown so
[21:56]: can put them in our 425 degree oven
[22:08]: Echo set a timer for 10 minutes
[22:11]: oh that is very salty it's starting next
[22:14]: so one more thing we need to do now is
[22:17]: we need to melt some butter we're going
[22:19]: to melt some unsalted butter and when
[22:22]: our pretzels are done we're going to
[22:23]: butter them we're going to paint them
[22:26]: just like we did with the water we're
[22:29]: going to paint them with melted butter
[22:32]: so we'll show you when they're all done
[22:35]: how we do that okay these just came out
[22:38]: of the oven we cooked them for 12
[22:39]: minutes you can definitely tell
[22:42]: um where we got well they're very hot
[22:44]: where we got uh the baking soda mixture
[22:47]: pretty well and where we didn't because
[22:49]: those areas the areas that we did hit
[22:52]: really well are pretty brown and then
[22:54]: some areas are not Brown at all but I'm
[22:57]: pretty sure they're done
[22:58]: this one closed up a lot anyway not bad
[23:02]: for a first try right right so we've got
[23:06]: melted unsalted butter
[23:08]: and do you want to paint them yes let's
[23:11]: uh move it there so we don't get butter
[23:13]: all over the place
[23:16]: somehow I managed to yeah you're my son
[23:23]: so these will be buttery pretzels she
[23:26]: said it here folks I'm her son
[23:30]: well we all knew that
[23:31]: [Music]
[23:40]: there we go we're gonna let these cool
[23:41]: for a few minutes so we're gonna taste
[23:43]: them and we'll be back to let you know
[23:45]: what we think
[23:46]: [Music]
[23:54]: on this episode of clicking the books
[23:56]: with Heather you watched us make soft
[23:58]: pretzels from the America's Test Kitchen
[24:01]: book of the complete baking book for
[24:04]: young chefs for with my young Chef right
[24:07]: here and uh to be fair be entirely
[24:11]: truthful we forgot to film this right
[24:14]: afterwards
[24:15]: so I'm not sure we remember a whole lot
[24:18]: about these but what do you remember I
[24:22]: remember that
[24:24]: we didn't put as much salt on these as
[24:27]: you as we did on your your pretzels
[24:30]: right so I made pretzels before this and
[24:32]: with a different method and somebody
[24:34]: thought they were way too salty they
[24:37]: were so we used less salt I think than
[24:40]: they said here which was better
[24:41]: right yeah
[24:43]: um this used a
[24:46]: much more kid-friendly uh version of the
[24:51]: baking soda
[24:53]: uh usually you boil the pretzels in
[24:56]: baking soda and that can be a little bit
[24:58]: difficult for you know a little bit
[24:59]: hazardous for a younger Chef right
[25:04]: so so this one we just brushed it with a
[25:09]: baking soda and water mixture which I
[25:11]: think we didn't do a great job of
[25:13]: getting all of the areas brushed because
[25:16]: that's what helps you get the really
[25:17]: really Brown pretzel
[25:20]: uh color and flavor
[25:23]: so we didn't do a great job with that so
[25:25]: I think the boiling is better but this
[25:27]: is actually fine for the younger chefs
[25:30]: but just be a little bit more careful to
[25:31]: get it all over the pretzel
[25:37]: what's that stuff
[25:39]: it's probably a lot of people eat
[25:41]: pretzels with mustard so that's probably
[25:43]: what that is maybe honey mustard
[25:46]: um but we found it relatively easy right
[25:49]: it wasn't too hard shaping them takes a
[25:52]: little practice
[25:54]: right it was a little bit difficult to
[25:56]: get the shape right
[25:58]: but once you do it it gets easier and so
[26:01]: if you make these more often they'd be
[26:02]: pretty easy
[26:04]: and they were pretty good they tasted
[26:05]: they were a little bit more bready than
[26:08]: pretzly but it was still really good so
[26:11]: in my opinion what do you think
[26:15]: um well I think that
[26:19]: on your face
[26:20]: I feel like
[26:22]: we I feel like everyone should enjoy the
[26:26]: pretzels as much as everyone else okay
[26:30]: so I feel like I agree with you
[26:32]: okay
[26:34]: did you did you enjoy the pretzels
[26:36]: yes very much we really like soft
[26:38]: pretzels right
[26:42]: yes is that it
[26:45]: all right so if you enjoyed watching us
[26:49]: make this please give us a thumbs up hit
[26:52]: the Subscribe button and come back and
[26:55]: watch some and watch something else next
[26:57]: week that's right hopefully we'll get a
[26:59]: little a few more of these out now
[27:01]: because we have several that we filmed
[27:03]: we just
[27:04]: have an editing back box so
[27:08]: we'll see you soon
[27:10]: [Music]