No, you’re not dreaming, this is a vegan pretzel bread. Which means, pretzel French toast, pretzel grilled cheese, pretzel burger buns, pretzel toast with Nutella … You can go wild.
You’re welcome.
How it started:
While I’m sure that I’m not the first one who has made bread like this, I am proud to say that I thought of it myself. Like a big boy.
Here is how it started:
Léa wanted us to make those awesome Tofu Burgers and if you know me by now, you know that I don’t buy burger buns. They are so easy to make and I like to make them myself. As I was shaping the buns I thought: Why don’t I give these babies an alkaline bath (Water + Baking soda) and then bake them. Pretzel Buns!
From there it kind of spiraled into ‘Why don’t I just make this into an actual loaf?’
From there, pretzel bread and our family have been bffs. True story.
Pretzel Bread:
Pretzel are a lot of fun to make, not to mention that they taste so good and it was pretty natural for me to think of a way to extend that concept to other things I love.
The very fact, that pretzels needs to be boiled in an alkaline bath before going into the oven gives them that phenomenal texture and taste that we all love. If you don’t apply this step, you are basically just making bread and you will not end up having that signature color we all love.
With that in mind, here is the formula to make perfect pretzel bread:
Yeast: You need to proof your yeast. That basically means wait until your yeast foams up and doubles in size before you get started. Here is how you do it:
2 ¼ tsp of yeast, ½ tsp of sugar and ¼ cup of warm water.
Dough: Flour to liquid ratio should be somewhere close to 2:1 , if your dough is sticky, it means you have done a good job.
Alkaline bath: For 3 Cups of water, you use 1 Tbsp of baking soda.
Boil first, bake second.
That’s really it, as long as you respect these steps; you should end up with very soft and awesome pretzel looking things.
Sounds good ? Why don’t you pin this and make it later !
Hope this recipe will bring you as much joy as it brought Lea. She seriously kept on asking for pretzel bread ever since. I wonder if it was a mistake to introduce her to that (she’s a carbaholic lol)… Ah she’ll be fine.
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Enjoy,
Idriss
Vegan Pretzel Bread
Ingredients
- 4 Cups all purpose flour
- 1/3 cup vegan butter melted
- 1 1/3 cup warm water not too hot, just above room temp
- 1 pinch salt
- coarse salt to decorate on top, optional
Yeast proofing:
- 2 1/4 tsp of yeast + 1/2 tsp of sugar + 1/4 cup of warm water.
Alkaline bath:
- 6 cups of water + 2 Tbsp of baking soda.
Instructions
- Take all your yeast proofing ingredients and mix them together. Set aside until it foams and doubles in size.
In your stand mixer:
- Mix your flour and salt.
- Add the proofed yeast and melted butter.
- Set your stand mixer to low speed and add your water very slowly.
- Once you use all your water is used. Set the speed to high and let it do it's thing for 5-6 minutes.
- Take your dough out. It should be very sticky.
- Cut in 4 and shape it into 4 balls.
- Spray a baking sheet with some oil, place your 4 dough balls in there, making sure that you space them by at least 3-4 inches.
- Cover with a towel and let rise for 45 minutes or until it doubles in size.
- Prepare your alkaline bath by putting the water (6 cups) in a large pot and bringing it to a boil. Add your baking soda.
- Pre heat your oven to 375F.
- Using a very sharp knife, make a a couple of incisions in your dough balls and boil them for 1-2 minutes each ONE AT A TIME. Boiling them one a time ensures that the temperature in your bath will not drop.
- Lay some parchemin paper on a loaf pan, and put your dough balls one next the the other in the pan. I could only fit 2 in my pan. So this recipe made 2 loaves. Yaye !
- *If you don't have parchemin paper, you can just oil your loaf pan. Please note that this will make your pretzel loaf more crispy on the bottom and sides.
- Bake for 15 to 20 minutes or until golden brown.
Notes
Wow…. They look delicious! Thanks for sharing!
You’re welcome Joseyphina ! Thank you for stopping by 🙂
Hi Idriss! This looks so good 🙂 We would love to have you share this over at this week’s Dishing It and Digging It party! Please feel free to join http://www.angiethefreckledrose.com/dishing-it-digging-it-132/
I sure will ! Thank you for the invite
This bread looks so cozy and delicious! I love how few ingredients there are. It’s pure, simple goodness. The coarse salt makes such a beautiful loaf as well…lovely!
Looks delicious! Pinned it so I can try the recipe later. Thanks!
I never thought I’d say this about bread but that bread is beautiful! If I can make bread like that someday I will be one happy baker!