My very first memory is of getting lye in my eye. One of my parents thew the scoop into tge lye and a poof went straight into my eye. It's a miracle I can see through both eyes. Chef John is serious abouhow caustic that baked Food Soda is!
Great video, but when it comes to the dipping and the gloves, just use a deeper container for the "lye" solution and place them on a slotted spatula or spider.
I was born and raised in Munich and worked at the Oktoberfest for several years in my youth. If these pretzels taste only half as good as they look, then that's a real treat. Chapeau!
Now you have to do a video for "Obatzda" - the authentic German / Bavarian beer cheese dip (Brie or Camembert, soft butter, cream cheese, paprika plain or smoked, minced shallots, chives, black pepper... and beer).
Ever since I left Germany (Bavaria) I've been trying to get this recipe right and have failed every time :(. It just doesn't taste the same as German dip. I'd love for someone to give me a recipe that's authentic to Munich
Plus no lye :( I will never get why people are perfectly fine using drain cleaner ( in which there's plenty of lye) and then freak out when it comes to making authentic Brezeln. The baking soda simply won't give you the same results. You can buy food safe lye at the A online shop. To me as a Swabian the thickness is all wrong but since Chef John is making Bavarian Brezeln, I'll let that slide.
They look really good! Usually we don't make them with beer in the dough, we just use water and / or milk. Save the beer for a drink ;) Oh and you should definitely eat them with butter for an even tastier snack! I also love mine with cream cheese and chives or green onion. But butter is the most classic way definitely!
Omg... the secret is to bake the powder. Most pretzel recipes that sub soda for lye do not mention that step at all! BRILLIANT trick! Thank you! I actually have some food grade lye in the garage but, knowing how toxic it is, I've been too chicken to use it for cooking. ALL HAIL CHEF JOHN!
@@tommihommi1 hmmm..... I use that stuff to clean drains and strip seasoning from my cast iron pans. Call me a coward, if you like, but I'm going to try Chef John's technique first.
@@tommihommi1 thanks. I'll take that into consideration. I really need to read up on the history of how people came to decide that simmering dough in something so toxic was a good idea.
These look great and so yummy! There are on the thicker side, but I honestly prefer it this way than what you’d normally get of the mass produced Brezen at bakeries in Bavaria which are generally too dry. They go great with Obazda and I’d love to see your take on it, if you haven’t already made that before.
Oh I’m so glad to see this recipe. We just had our last farmers market today and a lovely man came every week with his wood fired oven and his pretzels are amazing.
As we are headed back to Austria to ski this winter where these pretzels are everywhere, I was inspired to give these a try. My first batch did not turn out. The dough was too dry - About 3 1/3 cups not good enough. The second attempt was a success; I measured the 3 1/3 cups of flour EXACTLY. Made all the difference. Recipe turned out great. I heated the water for the lye bath in the microwave - 135 degrees F is pretty high for most people's homes out of the tap. The beer flavor really comes across. The only tricky part was in the rolling out the dough. You really need to put down some pressure as you extend outward to get them to "grow". By the time I got to the last one, was an expert.
Great srep by step instructions. They look like the one I eat in Germany. I love how you made the baking soda bath to coat the dough. I used to boil water and add baking soda, what a mess that was. Thank you for the tutorial
Here's a tip: after shaping the pretzels, put them on your baking tray and then in the fridge for an hour before the bath. They will form a slight skin which will prevent them from unraveling when you pick them up. Plus it adds a slight crisp to the outer texture of the pretzel.
@@maydaygarden I have lived in the South most of my life and I've never seen a cauldron of grits or anyone making grits from lye. Maybe I just don't know the right people though, lol. I would definitely stick around to taste grits made from scratch! We buy our grits at the grocery store. I heard that outside of the South, grocery stores don't stock hominy grits! Now that is awful!
@@mygirldarby In order to prepare the corn for hominy they need to be cooked in lye. I don't know anybody down here who makes their own, but that's how hominy is made. The lye breaks down the hard exterior on corn and makes it much softer and easier to digest. The process is called Nixtamalization, from the Nahuatl name for the process (Aztecs, they gave it to the Spanish which is how it got over here)
Highly recommend close captioning so as not to be aggravated by his voice mannerisms….. His recipes and instructions are spot on. . This dude knows his cooking. Don’t hold his cadence against him. Every recipe I have tried is spot on. I just mute the sound… put close captioning on and viola!!!! All set. 😁
Hi Chef John , thnx for sharing this bretzel recipe, Never heard as a German ,Beer in the dough ?!😳 Even in Bavaria , but why not ?By the way : We have the most selection of best Bread and Cakes also the most selection of small goods ( salami ham etc) from the hole 🌍 world. Best regards from Germany 🇩🇪, Michelle🙋🏻♀️
Can you use the baking soda bath as a “wash” on regular rolls to give them that browned finish? I feel like that would be great to try on some of my Christmas baking
Nice Pretzels, only a few problems. The first is that the Bavarian Bretzel may be lovely, but the superior one is the Swabian one made with spelt. I also have to point out that the Bavarian bretzel is not cut at all and does not have as big of a belly. Also, a tip is to let the Pretzel have minutes uncovered in the fridge before you dunk them. This way they are easier to handle, and they will get a better crust. Sending some love from a lye Bretzel backing Swabian.
1st: the Bavarians have invented the Breze. Therefore: the Bavarian Breze only is the real thing and super-plus-superior in both taste and look! 2nd: okay, a Brezel is Swabian but without a t in front of the z!
I absolutely LOVE your videos chef! Your technique and fun style is awesome! And your recipes never disappoint. Thank you for sharing all this amazing content! ☺️
Oh My Gosh Chef John! They came out So Beautiful! Not to mention looking Absolutely Delicious! Which Of Course is No Surprise, Cuz after All, You are THE Chef John 😉
Very nice! Thanks for the recipe! The only thing I have to add is that if you cut the belly you get Swabian pretzels. The Bavarian pretzel breaks open by itself and therefore has a crunchier texture on the belly than the Swabian pretzel.
OMG! I've been missing these since I moved from Bavaria to Sweden 6 years ago! But I'm finally moving back in two weeks and getting pretzels is very high up on my priority list of things to do asap!!
If you bake sodium bicarbonate (aka baking soda or NaHCO3) you end up with sodium carbonate (Na2CO3) which is the lye Chinese people use for hand pulled noodles. The lye you need for pretzel, however, is made from sodium hydroxite (NaOH). It sure works your way, but the result will be ever so slightly different.
Lye Water solutions are sold from Asian Groceries and Amazon. The Koon Chun brand tends to often have it on amazon. Potassium Carbonate & Sodium Bi-Carbonate Solution (Lye Water) is the description. that will work instead of the baking baking soda @chef John from Food Wishes, also thank you for the easy to make Bavarian pretzels as we move into Oktoberfest. :D
Roasting baking soda turns it into washing soda (sodium bicarbonate -> sodium carbonate). You could just buy that without doing the roasting step - it’s pretty cheap. Pretzels look delicious :). Might have to try them this weekend
LOVE pretzels - beer, not so much. Can you substitute something else for the beer since I never have it around? Also, will it cause a problem if I use a metal spoon to bathe the pretzels instead of donning latex gloves? If so, what about a wooden one? 🎶And as always, thanks for sharing!🎶
A food wish for next year: of course we love our Oktobefrest pretzels and beer and varieties of mustard. But there are other tents there that feature great meals featuring game (both white/red meats), and would love to see your take on them. Even an Oktoberfest roast chicken would be awesome.
I vote for authentic bratwurst from scratch. The store where I live doesn't always carry the good ones - Johnsonville "brats" don't taste anything like what you get in Chicago - and that means paying a lot to get them from a butcher shop. Love me a good brat, seared on the grill and then slow-cooked in beer, with onions and bell peppers. It just says "Autumn."
I love the "Annie" bites. So I'm thinking don't worry about the belly, make them a nice long log and cut them accordingly. What is the final coating they use? It tastes buttery, it's probably not.
For anyone wondering what baking the baking soda does: You drive off water and convert the sodium bicarbonate to sodium carbonate. If you were using the same relative amount of solid in a given amount of water, the baking soda pH would be about 8.3, and the sodium carbonate would yield a pH of about 11-12. Pure lye will go to pH 14. Note that pH is a logarithmic scale, so something that's pH 14 is 10x more basic (caustic) than something pH 13... which means going from pH 12 to pH 14 is 100x as basic. So as Chef John said, the baked baking soda (sodium carbonate) gets much closer to using lye than regular baking soda (sodium bicarbonate), but is also still safer. Lye is nasty stuff.
I wonder - would dipping them into the alkaline solution using a spider strainer work (assuming enough depth of solution to cover the pretzels)? Definitely something to experiment with - I can't imagine the surface area 'covered' by the wires would be enough to significantly affect denaturing the bottom of the pretzels.
OMG! This bring back childhood memories of the Bavarin Pretzel shops that were in the mall. You have to pair it with a cheese sauce and I'll be in the 90's again!
Coming from the second-best Oktoberfest in the world, (Kitchener-Waterloo) I can't tell you how many of these I've eaten. Your's definitely look JUST as I recall and would love to try those cheesy ideas!
What you've made is washing soda/sodium ash from the baking soda. When you bake the sodium bicarbonate, the water (H20) and carbon dioxide (CO2) make a break for it, leaving behind the sodium carbonate (Na2CO3).
In case you want that Brezel "loaded", you can basically do exactly this recipe, but instead of forming them to knots you form them to a bun or "kaiser roll" I believe you call them. Then slice em and fill em like any kind of sandwich. I prefer 'em hearty but you can easily go sweet with 'em as well. Forming them like mini baguettes is also a very popular thing.
For many, it might just be easier / more economical to just purchase Washing Soda /Soda Ash. Heating the Baking Soda (Sodium Bicarbonate) drives off the moisture & carbon dioxide to yield Washing Soda /Soda Ash (Sodium Carbonate). 2 NaHCO3 (Baking Soda) → Na2CO3 (Washing Soda) + H2O + CO2
Absolutely true, what Existenceisillusion says. Washing soda is "technical" grade-- not free from impurities and contaminants that are unsafe to take internally! I wouldn't want to eat or have my mouth washed out with old-fashioned lye soap either!!! What was in that wood ash?!
Pretzelsalt is rockier than flaky sea salt and it does not get dissolved that easy, when the pretzels are still a little wet from the lye. Over here we call it "Hagelsalz" ... i know, it's still only salt, but for me it makes the difference ;-)
Chef John would this work if I used gluten free beer and flour with a buttload of xanthan gum? I haven't had a soft pretzel since being diagnosed coeliac, and this recipe looks simple enough to substitute, but not being a chef I could he so wrong lol
Supplement: caustic soda (sodium hydroxide, 3-5 percent content) This is the variant with which the baker works! The sodium hydroxide is available e.B. as small tablets, which only have to be dissolved in water. The bigger problem, however, is that the sodium hydroxide cookie is a hazardous substance and procurement can be difficult. It is probably easiest if you go to the baker of your trust and cover his needs there. Once the mixture has been stirred, the finished pastry is simply dipped in the cold caustic soda and can be further processed immediately! Advantage of this variant - it goes fast and you get a perfect and very thin crust! Mix baking soda with water! Sounds almost as if we now also get a caustic soda, but this is not comparable to a real lye! Get some baking soda from the food market and just put it in a saucepan with water. On 2.5 liters of water you give in about 7.5 tablespoons of baking soda.
These make great pretzels. I will say having made these using baking soda and actual lye bath. Nthe lye bath gives a distinctive flavor the BS does not. There is a reason the old German bakeries still use lye. But I love the beer added to your recipe gives a great flavor.
as a bavarian my recommendation is "Obatzda", it goes extremely well with Brezen (pretzels) and beer. just one comment regarding the baking soda bath: it's not concentrated NaOH, you do not have to be that scared of it, please use a big pot and boil the water
Several orders of magnitude, all you are doing is making a combination of Bicarbonate, Carbonate and Oxide of Sodium, and under this mild heating there will be very little Sodium Oxide, which when dissolved forms sodium hydroxide, lye. The carbonate forms a higher pH solution than the bicarbonate, with the hydroxide raising it even more. Pure lye solution would have a pH in the 11 - 13 range while I would guess that this one would be somewhere in the 8 - 10 range, so boiling water isn’t a problem, but I would still wear gloves
I had to sign a waiver to even virtually handle lye in my distance-learning chemistry class. Chef is just like, "Nah I'm just going to whip some up in my kitchen".
I have pickling lye around, would that work, or should I just stick with the baking soda?? I adore soft pretzels and am excited to try this recipe but wanted to ask about the lye first. :)
I can't keep up with you!! (and that's a good thing - This weekend I'm making your apple cider glazed pork chops with the sweet potato Gnocchi and a raspberry apple salad).
What about sprinkle some corn meal before placing the pretzels on the baking sheet, so the pretzels have a slightly crispier bottom? I think you did it in your "Pizza Dough Pretzels" recipe.
Whatever tutes your flute though you might get a weird look or two dipping just pretzel and nothing else into mustard in Germany :D, the traditional paring for pretzels would be some Bavarian white sausages, sweet mustard and of course some yeast beer
@@aaron74 Yes or the thick part is sliced open and some butter is spread on which would be something that is served as a snack at events. Sometimes I'll also put some salami or something on there. The lye taste also works quite well with something sweet like nutella though thay obviously is not traditional or anything. In general most things you otherwise put on bread will be fine. I don't think most of us are pretzel purists who will scold you for putting on there whatever you like but just mustard always seems like a bit of an odd one
@@ffffffffffffffffffffffffvck Yeah here in the states, mustard is a very commonly served with fresh pretzels. Sometimes a very strong mustard that clears your sinuses. Usually that mustard and some cheese sauce of a relatively thin viscosity.
My very first memory is of getting lye in my eye.
One of my parents thew the scoop into tge lye and a poof went straight into my eye. It's a miracle I can see through both eyes. Chef John is serious abouhow caustic that baked Food Soda is!
Great video, but when it comes to the dipping and the gloves, just use a deeper container for the "lye" solution and place them on a slotted spatula or spider.
The spider is an essential buy, both for convenience and safety
But when they inevitably fall apart, I'd need the gloves to put them back into place, as shown.
They probably wouldn't fall apart so easily if they weren't being flipped upside down because of the too-shallow container.
I was born and raised in Munich and worked at the Oktoberfest for several years in my youth. If these pretzels taste only half as good as they look, then that's a real treat. Chapeau!
Now you have to do a video for "Obatzda" - the authentic German / Bavarian beer cheese dip (Brie or Camembert, soft butter, cream cheese, paprika plain or smoked, minced shallots, chives, black pepper... and beer).
Yes Ma'am! I was going to inquire about that as well.
Ever since I left Germany (Bavaria) I've been trying to get this recipe right and have failed every time :(. It just doesn't taste the same as German dip. I'd love for someone to give me a recipe that's authentic to Munich
And usually caraway. But that's a matter of taste.
I just watched Chef Frank from protocooks make Obatzda, I didn't have a clue what it was and it looked so delicious. German food is amazing
@@xxPenjoxx It's Bavarian food. German food as such is much more diverse.
Servus & greetings from Bavaria - never saw a single pretzel here looking like one of those, although yours does look quite tasty!
Yeah it's more like a Laugenstange with thin ends
Let’s call them “American-Bavarian Brezel”, but I agree those look nothing like real Brezn. 😁
Plus no lye :( I will never get why people are perfectly fine using drain cleaner ( in which there's plenty of lye) and then freak out when it comes to making authentic Brezeln. The baking soda simply won't give you the same results. You can buy food safe lye at the A online shop. To me as a Swabian the thickness is all wrong but since Chef John is making Bavarian Brezeln, I'll let that slide.
Hab ich auch gedacht, sieht aber lecker aus!
I love your recipes and videos Chef John, but I have to agree: They look fantastic, but not at all like a bavarian brezel.🥨💙
They look really good! Usually we don't make them with beer in the dough, we just use water and / or milk. Save the beer for a drink ;) Oh and you should definitely eat them with butter for an even tastier snack! I also love mine with cream cheese and chives or green onion. But butter is the most classic way definitely!
Omg... the secret is to bake the powder. Most pretzel recipes that sub soda for lye do not mention that step at all! BRILLIANT trick! Thank you! I actually have some food grade lye in the garage but, knowing how toxic it is, I've been too chicken to use it for cooking. ALL HAIL CHEF JOHN!
Just use the lye please
@@tommihommi1 hmmm..... I use that stuff to clean drains and strip seasoning from my cast iron pans. Call me a coward, if you like, but I'm going to try Chef John's technique first.
@@jspuckett73 5% dilution and use gloves. Every single bakery in southern Germany does this daily
@@tommihommi1 thanks. I'll take that into consideration. I really need to read up on the history of how people came to decide that simmering dough in something so toxic was a good idea.
@@jspuckett73 where do you get the idea of simmering? You don't heat the lye, god no. You just dunk the dough in it.
These look great and so yummy! There are on the thicker side, but I honestly prefer it this way than what you’d normally get of the mass produced Brezen at bakeries in Bavaria which are generally too dry. They go great with Obazda and I’d love to see your take on it, if you haven’t already made that before.
I thoroughly enjoy your videos!
That said, I’ve never heard anyone’s conversational tone of voice cover so many octaves!! 🎶😮
Wow. You know it's serious when Chef John wears gloves.
You are the main reflection of your digit protection.
No...
Oh I’m so glad to see this recipe. We just had our last farmers market today and a lovely man came every week with his wood fired oven and his pretzels are amazing.
Another night of binge-watching Chef John. I hope I can find enough unwatched episodes for a few hours! ❤️
"It's best if we start with the wurst."
What a brat you are, Chef John
🤣 I loved that pun
2 atrocious puns in one sentence, nooooo! xD
I am going to pull an ab muscle from groaning.
That's a pretty frank statement.
@@sixstringedthing ha!
Another way to eat them: Slice them horizontally, butter them and add a generous amount of fresh chopped chives
I thought you were going to say, "Butter them, and sprinkle with a dash of cayenne!" lol
@@dalmatianluvr It's Chef John so that goes without saying, 😃 But I really liked this video recipe. No offence meant
droooolll
Butterbreze.
ah yes, Nurnberg breakfast style
As we are headed back to Austria to ski this winter where these pretzels are everywhere, I was inspired to give these a try. My first batch did not turn out. The dough was too dry - About 3 1/3 cups not good enough. The second attempt was a success; I measured the 3 1/3 cups of flour EXACTLY. Made all the difference. Recipe turned out great. I heated the water for the lye bath in the microwave - 135 degrees F is pretty high for most people's homes out of the tap. The beer flavor really comes across. The only tricky part was in the rolling out the dough. You really need to put down some pressure as you extend outward to get them to "grow". By the time I got to the last one, was an expert.
Great srep by step instructions. They look like the one I eat in Germany. I love how you made the baking soda bath to coat the dough. I used to boil water and add baking soda, what a mess that was. Thank you for the tutorial
Here's a tip: after shaping the pretzels, put them on your baking tray and then in the fridge for an hour before the bath. They will form a slight skin which will prevent them from unraveling when you pick them up. Plus it adds a slight crisp to the outer texture of the pretzel.
I'm going to try that! Thanks!
Lol, my German friend definitely has lye sitting around her house. And she definitely makes the best pretzels!!
I bet more than a few Southerners have some lye for their cauldrons of hominy. It's an all-day thing, cooked outdoors.
Can I be friends with your German friend too?
@@maydaygarden I have lived in the South most of my life and I've never seen a cauldron of grits or anyone making grits from lye. Maybe I just don't know the right people though, lol. I would definitely stick around to taste grits made from scratch! We buy our grits at the grocery store. I heard that outside of the South, grocery stores don't stock hominy grits! Now that is awful!
We also keep lye in the kitchen for bretzels. It freaks people out when they know how a proper bretzel ist macht but, they do not stop eating it
@@mygirldarby In order to prepare the corn for hominy they need to be cooked in lye. I don't know anybody down here who makes their own, but that's how hominy is made.
The lye breaks down the hard exterior on corn and makes it much softer and easier to digest. The process is called Nixtamalization, from the Nahuatl name for the process (Aztecs, they gave it to the Spanish which is how it got over here)
Highly recommend close captioning so as not to be aggravated by his voice mannerisms….. His recipes and instructions are spot on. . This dude knows his cooking. Don’t hold his cadence against him. Every recipe I have tried is spot on. I just mute the sound… put close captioning on and viola!!!! All set. 😁
Hi Chef John , thnx for sharing this bretzel recipe, Never heard as a German ,Beer in the dough ?!😳
Even in Bavaria , but why not ?By the way :
We have the most selection of best Bread and Cakes also the most selection of small goods ( salami ham etc) from the hole 🌍 world.
Best regards from Germany 🇩🇪, Michelle🙋🏻♀️
Can you use the baking soda bath as a “wash” on regular rolls to give them that browned finish? I feel like that would be great to try on some of my Christmas baking
You can on proper hard rolls. We make lye rolls and they are nummy!
who the hell downvotes, this looks great!
Chef John is a national treasure. I love your videos. You always make me smile.
Nice Pretzels, only a few problems. The first is that the Bavarian Bretzel may be lovely, but the superior one is the Swabian one made with spelt. I also have to point out that the Bavarian bretzel is not cut at all and does not have as big of a belly. Also, a tip is to let the Pretzel have minutes uncovered in the fridge before you dunk them. This way they are easier to handle, and they will get a better crust. Sending some love from a lye Bretzel backing Swabian.
1st: the Bavarians have invented the Breze. Therefore: the Bavarian Breze only is the real thing and super-plus-superior in both taste and look!
2nd: okay, a Brezel is Swabian but without a t in front of the z!
“These pretzels are making me thirsty”
What is this salty discharge?
Do you yearn, Adam...
I'm pretty sure you meant "these *pretzels* are making me _thirsty_ "?
"it's best if we start with the wurst" really got me :D
I absolutely LOVE your videos chef! Your technique and fun style is awesome! And your recipes never disappoint. Thank you for sharing all this amazing content! ☺️
You're the Bob Ross of RUclips cooking video's.
Thank you!!
Oh My Gosh Chef John! They came out So Beautiful! Not to mention looking Absolutely Delicious! Which Of Course is No Surprise, Cuz after All, You are THE Chef John 😉
Why I thought of Jurassic Park 1 talking about “slash across the belly”. Dr. Grant scared that boy 😂
I thought of that exact scene, too.
Very nice! Thanks for the recipe!
The only thing I have to add is that if you cut the belly you get Swabian pretzels. The Bavarian pretzel breaks open by itself and therefore has a crunchier texture on the belly than the Swabian pretzel.
When I get a notification that you have uploaded a video, my happy time begins 📸❣️🍊♥️🥳😘🥰🤩❤️
Just ordered a pound of lye! I will use it for other stuff as well such as for nixtamalizing corn and making ramen noodles :-) Very excited.
Nice!
I love you "this old tony"...from machinist to everyday simple recipes 🤟😎🥂
A great reminder why I follow Chef John
Chef John, you are just great! I'm not afraid to make pretzels anymore 😃!
OMG! I've been missing these since I moved from Bavaria to Sweden 6 years ago! But I'm finally moving back in two weeks and getting pretzels is very high up on my priority list of things to do asap!!
If you bake sodium bicarbonate (aka baking soda or NaHCO3) you end up with sodium carbonate (Na2CO3) which is the lye Chinese people use for hand pulled noodles. The lye you need for pretzel, however, is made from sodium hydroxite (NaOH). It sure works your way, but the result will be ever so slightly different.
Chef John said it was close.
As a native bavarian I need to say: Bravo!
looks good chef! obatzda or butter with it would be traditional in bavaria. or even cream cheese (+ chives). but any dip works
thank you for making the complicated recipes turn into simple one :)
You had me rolling with the robot hands ! Thank you can’t wait to try this .
Pretzels and tons of beer, ahhh memories from when I was in Stuttgart. Epic.
Visit Philly next? We also have tons of both. (and a Germantown)
@@ihateregistrationbul I would like to do it someday, but it is on the other side of the world :D
Going to Stuttgrart to get Brezn and Beer is like going to Canada to have Texas style chili. I love poutine btw....
@@patrese993 i did not go specially for that. I was there for a month, so why not combine
Lye Water solutions are sold from Asian Groceries and Amazon. The Koon Chun brand tends to often have it on amazon. Potassium Carbonate & Sodium Bi-Carbonate Solution (Lye Water) is the description. that will work instead of the baking baking soda @chef John from Food Wishes, also thank you for the easy to make Bavarian pretzels as we move into Oktoberfest. :D
Roasting baking soda turns it into washing soda (sodium bicarbonate -> sodium carbonate). You could just buy that without doing the roasting step - it’s pretty cheap.
Pretzels look delicious :). Might have to try them this weekend
LOVE pretzels - beer, not so much. Can you substitute something else for the beer since I never have it around? Also, will it cause a problem if I use a metal spoon to bathe the pretzels instead of donning latex gloves? If so, what about a wooden one? 🎶And as always, thanks for sharing!🎶
Water works just fine
Awesome advice at the end Chef!!!👌
In Munich it's also very popular to cut the Brezel in half and spread it with cream cheese and maybe sprinkle some chives onto them.
A food wish for next year: of course we love our Oktobefrest pretzels and beer and varieties of mustard. But there are other tents there that feature great meals featuring game (both white/red meats), and would love to see your take on them. Even an Oktoberfest roast chicken would be awesome.
I vote for authentic bratwurst from scratch. The store where I live doesn't always carry the good ones - Johnsonville "brats" don't taste anything like what you get in Chicago - and that means paying a lot to get them from a butcher shop. Love me a good brat, seared on the grill and then slow-cooked in beer, with onions and bell peppers. It just says "Autumn."
Looks almost like croissant on the outside! Thanks for the neat tip on the baking soda. I must try this
I made these yesterday and my husband and son said they're the best pretzels they've ever had! Thanks for the great recipe and tips.
I love you brother been watching your art class for years. well done
I would even ruin those with some straight up yellow French's and be stoked on it! Yum! 😄😍
I love the "Annie" bites. So I'm thinking don't worry about the belly, make them a nice long log and cut them accordingly. What is the final coating they use? It tastes buttery, it's probably not.
As someone who lives in Bavaria and doesn't like pretzels I have to say these look really good and I would try them.
Oooh, a little philosophy at the end of this one. These looked lovely, think I'll try.
Gorgeous work as always chef! Thank you!
I am Bavarian, and we eat Brezl with Weißwürstl and sweet custard and a Weißbier 😘
Susanne, du solltest wissen, dass wir in Bayern Brezen essen und keine Brezeln!!!
For anyone wondering what baking the baking soda does:
You drive off water and convert the sodium bicarbonate to sodium carbonate. If you were using the same relative amount of solid in a given amount of water, the baking soda pH would be about 8.3, and the sodium carbonate would yield a pH of about 11-12. Pure lye will go to pH 14.
Note that pH is a logarithmic scale, so something that's pH 14 is 10x more basic (caustic) than something pH 13... which means going from pH 12 to pH 14 is 100x as basic.
So as Chef John said, the baked baking soda (sodium carbonate) gets much closer to using lye than regular baking soda (sodium bicarbonate), but is also still safer. Lye is nasty stuff.
I wonder - would dipping them into the alkaline solution using a spider strainer work (assuming enough depth of solution to cover the pretzels)? Definitely something to experiment with - I can't imagine the surface area 'covered' by the wires would be enough to significantly affect denaturing the bottom of the pretzels.
OMG! This bring back childhood memories of the Bavarin Pretzel shops that were in the mall. You have to pair it with a cheese sauce and I'll be in the 90's again!
As a German pretzel lover I prefer to eat it with butter and sprinkled with chives ❤️ or sweet mustard or Obatzda.
Thanks Chef John!
I make these and they're yummy. I spray the baking soda mixture on. I don't have lye either.
Benny Harvey. Miss ya big man. Gone but not forgotten. R.I.P
Coming from the second-best Oktoberfest in the world, (Kitchener-Waterloo) I can't tell you how many of these I've eaten. Your's definitely look JUST as I recall and would love to try those cheesy ideas!
I like that area.
Do you eat those helicoidal radishes as well?
Great tutorial. 11pm was the wrong time to watch this.
*laughs in soap maker* I definitely have lye lying around
What you've made is washing soda/sodium ash from the baking soda. When you bake the sodium bicarbonate, the water (H20) and carbon dioxide (CO2) make a break for it, leaving behind the sodium carbonate (Na2CO3).
In case you want that Brezel "loaded", you can basically do exactly this recipe, but instead of forming them to knots you form them to a bun or "kaiser roll" I believe you call them. Then slice em and fill em like any kind of sandwich. I prefer 'em hearty but you can easily go sweet with 'em as well. Forming them like mini baguettes is also a very popular thing.
For many, it might just be easier / more economical to just purchase Washing Soda /Soda Ash.
Heating the Baking Soda (Sodium Bicarbonate) drives off the moisture & carbon dioxide to yield Washing Soda /Soda Ash (Sodium Carbonate).
2 NaHCO3 (Baking Soda) → Na2CO3 (Washing Soda) + H2O + CO2
In English, Doc!!
Absolutely true, what Existenceisillusion says. Washing soda is "technical" grade-- not free from impurities and contaminants that are unsafe to take internally! I wouldn't want to eat or have my mouth washed out with old-fashioned lye soap either!!! What was in that wood ash?!
Erm, they sell food grade Sodium Carbonate...
How is it more economical if you aren't doing this a lot?
Oktoberfest Munich ❤ best beer 🍻 🍻 🍻 best food... Funny and happy 😊
I make your pizza pretzels every Oktoberfest. Can't wait to try these!!
Add butter my friend! Best snack ever. Also please try pepper bretzel!
Pretzelsalt is rockier than flaky sea salt and it does not get dissolved that easy, when the pretzels are still a little wet from the lye. Over here we call it "Hagelsalz" ... i know, it's still only salt, but for me it makes the difference ;-)
Chef John, your videos are great. They are always to the point and I am always successful with your recipes.
Those are cute baby Bavarian pretzels! When we were in Bavaria they were usually 3X that size.
This makes me think of piroshki’s. Is there a video for those?
Instead of the gloves and flipping and splashing, could you just set the raw dough on a wok spider and dip it in a deeper bowl?
Have you ever done a video of sauerbraten. Amazing pickled roasted beef with tangy gravy. Please make in honor of Oktoberfest!!!
Very Very Nice Chef 👌🏽 👍🏼 👏🏽
Is it possible to skip the butter? or is it a absolute must? Can you also use whole wheat flour?
Chef John would this work if I used gluten free beer and flour with a buttload of xanthan gum? I haven't had a soft pretzel since being diagnosed coeliac, and this recipe looks simple enough to substitute, but not being a chef I could he so wrong lol
Supplement: caustic soda (sodium hydroxide, 3-5 percent content)
This is the variant with which the baker works! The sodium hydroxide is available e.B. as small tablets, which only have to be dissolved in water. The bigger problem, however, is that the sodium hydroxide cookie is a hazardous substance and procurement can be difficult. It is probably easiest if you go to the baker of your trust and cover his needs there. Once the mixture has been stirred, the finished pastry is simply dipped in the cold caustic soda and can be further processed immediately! Advantage of this variant - it goes fast and you get a perfect and very thin crust! Mix baking soda with water!
Sounds almost as if we now also get a caustic soda, but this is not comparable to a real lye! Get some baking soda from the food market and just put it in a saucepan with water. On 2.5 liters of water you give in about 7.5 tablespoons of baking soda.
These make great pretzels. I will say having made these using baking soda and actual lye bath. Nthe lye bath gives a distinctive flavor the BS does not. There is a reason the old German bakeries still use lye. But I love the beer added to your recipe gives a great flavor.
You are after all, the Marty McFly of your pretzels with no lye.
Those Brezeln are delicious. Sehr lecker! 👌
as a bavarian my recommendation is "Obatzda", it goes extremely well with Brezen (pretzels) and beer.
just one comment regarding the baking soda bath: it's not concentrated NaOH, you do not have to be that scared of it, please use a big pot and boil the water
This. "Baked baking soda" is an order of magnitude less dangerous than lye.
Several orders of magnitude, all you are doing is making a combination of Bicarbonate, Carbonate and Oxide of Sodium, and under this mild heating there will be very little Sodium Oxide, which when dissolved forms sodium hydroxide, lye. The carbonate forms a higher pH solution than the bicarbonate, with the hydroxide raising it even more. Pure lye solution would have a pH in the 11 - 13 range while I would guess that this one would be somewhere in the 8 - 10 range, so boiling water isn’t a problem, but I would still wear gloves
I never knew about using lye or baking the baking soda. I'll have to give that a try next time I make pretzels.
It ain't a pretzel without a lye bath (or baked baking soda bath I guess). Otherwise you just have bread that's in a pretzel shape.
I had to sign a waiver to even virtually handle lye in my distance-learning chemistry class. Chef is just like, "Nah I'm just going to whip some up in my kitchen".
I have pickling lye around, would that work, or should I just stick with the baking soda?? I adore soft pretzels and am excited to try this recipe but wanted to ask about the lye first. :)
I always put mine in boiling soda water which treats them and allows them to rise more all in one step. :)
I can't keep up with you!! (and that's a good thing - This weekend I'm making your apple cider glazed pork chops with the sweet potato Gnocchi and a raspberry apple salad).
jedem deutschen blutet das herz bei dem abgestandenen bier ohne krone 🤣
What about sprinkle some corn meal before placing the pretzels on the baking sheet, so the pretzels have a slightly crispier bottom? I think you did it in your "Pizza Dough Pretzels" recipe.
Yes, I bought the food grade lye. Can I use it in this recipe?
Omfg chef John. This is amazing
Nice. They are -just like me- a little it oversized at the bottom. But the more pretzel the more fun u have
Lye doesn’t lie…. Love it!
Chef John, can I substitute the lager with honey water?
MUSTARD! MUSSSSSTARD! I'm trying these soon. We've been craving pretzels and this video comes out🤘🏽
That's what I was thinking, why isn't he spreading a good spicy brown mustard on those! Ha ha ha
Whatever tutes your flute though you might get a weird look or two dipping just pretzel and nothing else into mustard in Germany :D, the traditional paring for pretzels would be some Bavarian white sausages, sweet mustard and of course some yeast beer
@@ffffffffffffffffffffffffvck So do you just enjoy the pretzel plain, with no condiment?
@@aaron74 Yes or the thick part is sliced open and some butter is spread on which would be something that is served as a snack at events. Sometimes I'll also put some salami or something on there. The lye taste also works quite well with something sweet like nutella though thay obviously is not traditional or anything. In general most things you otherwise put on bread will be fine. I don't think most of us are pretzel purists who will scold you for putting on there whatever you like but just mustard always seems like a bit of an odd one
@@ffffffffffffffffffffffffvck Yeah here in the states, mustard is a very commonly served with fresh pretzels. Sometimes a very strong mustard that clears your sinuses. Usually that mustard and some cheese sauce of a relatively thin viscosity.