Sourdough Rosemary Pretzels
18 Pretzels
Ingredients:
2 cups warm water (just warm to touch)
½ cup of your sourdough starter (remember to feed your mother starter!)
3 Tbsp vegetable or canola oil
3 Tbsp dark brown sugar
3 tsp. instant yeast (I keep a jar of Fleischmann’s Active Dry Yeast ready in the fridge)
6 cups bread flour
2 Tbsp Kosher salt (plus 4 tsps. for prepping the pretzels on their final rise)
1 ½ Tbsp finely chopped fresh rosemary
½ cup baking soda (dissolved in 2 quarts water)
1) In the bowl of your standing mixer, combine the warm water, your starter, the oil, brown sugar and yeast and whisk to combine. Let sit 5 minutes until alive and foamy.
2) Whisk together the flour, salt and rosemary in a small bowl. Add to the wet mix and combine with the dough hook on low speed until the dough comes together and starts to clean the side of the bowl. This should take about 6-8 minutes. On humid days, you may need to add up to ¼ cup additional flour – BUT NO MORE!
3) Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and need for about 1 minute until elastic and smooth. Place the dough in a lightly oiled large bowl and cover the bowl with plastic wrap. Let rise until doubled – about one hour.
4) Deflate the dough with your fist and turn it out onto a lightly floured surface. Divide the dough evenly into 18 portions. This is the perfect time to use your digital scale. The last two times I made these, each portion weighed about 90 grams.
5) Line 2 baking sheets with parchment and lightly flour the surfaces.
6) To shape the pretzels: Roll each portion into a 16” rope (Ill. 1). Bend the rope into a U-shape with the ends facing away from you (Ill. 2). Twist the rope ends twice (Ill. 3). Fold the twist over the top towards the bottom of the U. Press the ends firmly into the bottom of the curve (Ill. 4). The ends should be about 1” apart. Place the pretzels on the parchment-lined pans – 9 per pan.
7) Cover the pretzels loosely with plastic wrap and let rest until puffy. This should take about 20 minutes. While the pretzels rest, dissolve ½ cup baking soda in 2 quarts of water and bring to a boil over medium high heat. Also preheat your oven to 425 degrees, placing the two racks in the upper-middle and lower-middle positions.
8) With a light touch, place three of the pretzels, knot side down, in the boiling water. After 15 seconds, flip the pretzels and let poach 15 seconds more. Lift them out with a slotted spatula and let dry on a wire rack for five minutes (knot side up). Continue until all 18 pretzels are poached.
9) Wipe the flour from the parchment-lined pans and sprinkle each pan with 1 tsp Kosher salt. Transfer the pretzels to the pans and sprinkle them with additional Kosher salt (to taste – I like my pretzels salty!). Bake the pretzels 15 to 20 minutes until mahogany brown, switching the pans halfway through. Transfer the baked pretzels to a wire rack to cool.
