Homemade Soft Pretzels

Let me tell you a secret: I can`t keep my hands off any baked good that has a crispy outside and a fluffy, soft interior. It`s heaven! Give me a Coke together with a pretzel and you have me staying with you forever. 

There is a pretzel shop in our small town. It`s called "Gigi". What? Strange name for a shop that sells hundreds of pretzels every day. Believe it or not, it`s almost impossible to buy a pretzel if you are in an extreme hurry and can`t sneak in front of the queue. This is the main reason I usually have breakfast at home...

Whatever, I really felt like eating pizza and pretzels. Lots of carbs on my mind. So I made these...out of- you`ll never guess!

Pizza dough. Well, I found myself with leftover dough and as I craved pretzels, I satisfied both my cravings. Ain`t that cool? I don`t like to waste anything, so I end up turning it into a delicious food, or snack or whatever you like. `Cos this is how I roll.

There is really nothing I don`t like about this recipe: crispy crust, soft interior and good taste. Perfect for every comfort activity. 

The golden brown color is given by the egg I brushed them with just before baking. Altough, be careful with how much egg you put on them or else you`ll end up with some sort of egg-y bread taste...which is not cool, in my opinion. Also, feel free to omit the egg and substitute it with milk, heavy cream or olive oil. 

Oh, maybe you wonder what those black things are, yea, the one which I sprinkled over my pretzels. Those are dried chilli pepper flakes. I just can`t explain my love for spicy food and my obsession of adding pepper, chilli or curry in my meals. Ok, I`m not adding spoonfulls, but a pinch of them is enough. In my tea (yeah, don`t judge me), bruschetta, toast, pizza, pasta (especially), meat or soup. Each dish I`m eating has to be spicy to please me. The future taste won`t be sweet, salty nor sour, but spicy. Spices are the future! Oh, I`m starting to talk nonsense.

This is the closest I could get.  Just wanting to show you the soft inside. H-E-A-V-E-N! 

I`m so sorry for the low quality of my pictures, my shooting camera is a cheap Nikon d3100. I`m planning to get some nice lenses this time. The only problem is the not-so-big budget. I sometimes am so angry whenever I see a spoiled child with an expensive photo camera and he does not know how to use it properly. And then he creates some stupid Facebook page which is titled "(their name) Photography". I`m not talking about the ones who really take great pictures, but the internet is full of people with excellent cameras but horrible pictures. This is my opinion and if you feel like I`ve brought an offense to you, bear in mind that this is my personal thought of the situation. Thank you. Now let`s go on...

The hardest part in this recipe is just the kneading. Which makes me mad, especially on summer days when its hot and I have to twist, punch and pull that dough until it is elastic and no longer sticky. Another thing about making pretzels is boiling them in water+baking soda. Exactly! This ensures the lovely crust and absolute perfect interior. Don`t worry about the large amount of baking soda you find in this recipe, they will taste nothing like that. You have my word! 

Ingredients:

500 gr. all purpose flour

1 package (7 gr) active dry yeast

300 ml. lukewarm water (between 100-110 degrees F/50-60 C)

1 and 1/2 tsp salt 

1 Tablespoon of sugar

For boiling pretzels:

1 and 1/2 (1500 ml) l of water

1/4 cup baking soda

For the top:

1 egg beaten with 2 tablespoons of water/milk/cream

kosher salt, sesame seeds, poppy seeds, sugar or any kind of topping you prefer

Directions:

1. In a bowl, combine the lukewarm water with the sugar and yeast. Let it rest for 5 minutes or until it becomes foamy and you can smell it. That means it has activated.

2. In a large bowl, dump the flour and salt, whisking them a bit. Make a indentation/well in the center of it and pour the water-yeast mixture in there. Using a wooden spoon, your hand or a mixer, start combining everything together in a big, stiff mass. Once you`ve done that, use your hand to bring it out on a lightly floured surface and knead it for 15 minutes or until you get an smooth, elastic and no longer sticky dough.

3. Lightly oil a big bowl and place the dough in it, rotating it so that it is coated in oil. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap or a kitchen towel and let it rise for 1 hour or until it has doubled in size. 

4. Punch the dough down and put it on you floured surface. Knead it 2 more minutes and divide it into half. Now cut each half into 6 pieces, You should end up with 12 pieces of dough.

Roll the dough into a rope (using your hands) and holding both ends, shape them into and "U". Now, twist the ends, then bring them towards yourself and press them down into a pretzel shape. Continue like this until you have no more pieces of dough.

5. Bring the water to the boiling point and add the baking soda. Now is the time to preheat your oven at 375 d F/180C/lvl 4 gas and line your baking trays with parchment paper. Take each pretzel and put it into the boiling water. Don`t put them all in! Only one or two at a time, depending on how large you pot is and leave them to rise in the water. That should take about 30 seconds to 1 minute. After you have done that, put the pretzels on the prepared baking sheets. Lightly brush the tops with the beaten egg and sprinkle salt/sesame seeds or your favorite topping. Bake into the preheated oven for 5-8 minutes or until golden brown.

Five o`Clock Cake Bars

Ok,so this is not a quick&easy cake. It requires a bit more involvement than,say, a classic apple cake which you just whip up and put in the oven. But it`s not that difficult at all if you follow the steps. However, you`ll end up with an impressive looking cake that tastes even better than you think.

At first sight, this is not the prettiest dessert of all, but wait until you bite into it. A layer of Angel Food sheet cake full of chocolate, Turkish delight, walnuts and raisins, sandwiched together between two wafer sheets and a smooth, gooey  vanilla cream.

However, I need to warn you against the entire process of making the cream: it is time (and patience) consuming. Also, it contains a good amount of egg yolk, so if you don`t feel comfortable using them, feel free to substitute this cream with vanilla pudding, it will still be scrumptious. The cream is made on a water bath/bain marie/double boiler until it thickens...and that takes about 30 minutes of whisking the yolks, sugar and butter constantly.

It`s worth it, trust me.

This being said, I don`t know what else is difficult about this cake...nothing. Oh yes, the wait. You have to (I can`t stress out how important this is) leave the cake overnight with something heavy on top, or else it will crack and tear apart when you try to cut it. That`s because the cream is very soft and oozy, which has to be allowed to make everything moist.

Don`t ask me why, but in my opinion this is a fancy dessert to serve. First of all, if you use mixed flavors of Turkish delight (I used only chocolate and strawberry, because this is what I had on hand) you`ll get both a good taste and pretty look.  The cream is so velvety and the Angel Food sheet cake is light. The wafer sheets give this cake a bit of texture. Remember, leave it in the fridge overnight so the flavors have plenty of time to blend.

Despite the fact that the amount of filling/cream is not large and there are the wafer sheets+sponge cake in the middle, you would think the cake is rather dry. Well, it is not. On the contrary, it is moist, yet not wet, tender and oh-so-good!

I had plenty a luck this morning and stumbled across some Teddi juice (yeah, it`s for kids) which was-and still is, my all time favorite drink of all times.

Leaving other details aside, I really recommend this cake. Instead of having breakfast first, I gobbled up a few (ok,5 to be more precise) bars and then reminded myself that I had an omelette waiting to be eaten. Well, I guess desserts are a temptation. 

Ingredients:

for the Angel Food sheet cake layer:

7 egg whites

7 Tablespoons granulated sugar

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

a pinch of salt

7 Tablespoons all purpose flour

100 gr. of your favorite chocolate -chopped-

100 gr. chopped walnuts (or any king of nuts you prefer)

170. gr. chopped Turkish delight (use mixed flavors)

100 gr. rum soaked raisins

additional: 2 wafer sheets

Directions:

1.Preheat oven to 180 C/lvl.4 gas/375 degrees F. Line the bottom of a rectangle sheet cake pan with parchment paper for easy removal of the cake. Set aside.

2. In a deep, large, grease free bowl whip the egg whites with the sugar and salt until stiff peaks form. Dump in the chopped chocolate, walnuts, Turkish delight and raisins. Fold them in very gently, or else you`ll deflate the whites. Sift the flour and baking powder together and incorporate them as well. Spread the batter into the prepared pan and bake 20-25 minutes or until golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Leave it to cool partially in the pan and then invert it on a platter to cool completely. Remove the parchment paper. 

For the vanilla cream:

7 egg yolks

200 gr. sugar

200 gr. room temperature butter

make a pastry cream out of: 100 ml milk, 70 gr. sugar, 2 heaping Tablespoons all purpose flour.

1. On a water bath/double boiler/bain marie whisk the egg yolk, sugar and butter together in a heat-proof bowl until thickened. That should take about 30-40 minutes. It is important that you don`t allow the boiling water to touch the surface of the bowl of else you`ll end up with scrambled yolks. Transfer the mixture in another bowl, cover it with plastic wrap and leave it to cool completely.

Make the pastry cream:

Combine all ingredients and whisk constantly until very thick. It will resemble soft butter when beaten. Cool completely as well.

2.In a large bowl, beat the pastry cream for 1 minute, just to smooth it out a bit. Drop 1 Tablespoon at a time from the yolk cream into it, beating very well with the mixer on high speed for 1 minute. Continue like this until you have a smooth cream.

Assemble the cake:

1. In the sheet pan which you previously used, arrange 1 wafer sheet (trim the ends if needed, so it can fit into the pan). Put half of the cream in the middle and carefully put the Angel Food sheet cake over it, pressing down gently to distribute the cream all over. Put the rest of the cream over it and end with a wafer sheet.

Cover the top of the cake with plastic wrap and put a cutting board over it. Now place something heavy on the cutting board, like a food processor or something of that sort. Pop it into the fridge for at least 6 hours or overnight works best.

Cut out bars with a serrated knife.