"These pretzels are making me thirsty."

I love soft pretzels, but haven't really been able to buy any because, 1) I would have to go to the mall to buy one, and 2) If I am there, Thomas is usually with me and there is a big old sign on the window that says "Do not eat here if you have nut allergies."

I came across this recipe this afternoon and decided since I had nothing better to do, Thomas and I would try to make them. They are unbelievably good. They actually taste like the pretzels from the mall, go figure. Since I was bored, I decided to take pictures of the process and give you all a "bread" baking lesson.

Buttery Soft Pretzels

4 teaspoons active dry yeast
1 teaspoon sugar
1 1/4 cups warm water
4 1/2 cups flour
1/2 white sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 tablespoon olive oil

1 cup baking soda
8 cups hot water (almost to a boiling point)
kosher salt, for topping

1. In a small bowl, dissolve yeast and 1 teaspoon sugar in the warm water. Here is something I learned from my sis-in-law, let the yeast sit for a good 20 minutes and proof. You need to really let it puff up and get "creamy."

2. In your Kitchen Aid mixing bowl, sift together 1/2 cup sugar, flour and salt. I use a whisk and mix everything together so I don't have to get out my sifter. The whisk will do the same job as a sifter.

3. Make a well in the center of the dry mixture and add the yeast mixture and the olive oil.

4. After you have dumped your yeast and oil in the well, add your dough hook attachment and turn the mixer on low. Let the hook mix everything together slowly. If the dough looks too dry and it isn't "coming together", you can add teaspoons of water, one at a time, until it all comes together. You then need to let the mixer knead your dough for 7 minutes. You could pull the dough out and knead it yourself, but why do that? You are going to get a good enough arm work-out rolling the pretzels and shaping them.

5. After you have kneaded the dough for 7 minutes, place the dough ball in a lightly greased bowl and cover with plastic wrap. The dough will be smooth, but very dense. I like to stick my bowl under a window to let rise. If it is too cold, you can turn on your oven to 200 degrees with a pan of water in it. Heat the oven up, turn it off, and then place your dough in. The water and the heat will make the oven nice and humid (that is a trick I learned when I was working at Cinnabon 18 years ago )

6. Let the dough rise one hour. It should feel a lot less heavy and dense after the rising.

7. Now here is the therapeutic part. Take your dough ball and divide it into 12 balls. Take each ball and make it into a really long snake and twist it up to make a pretzel shape. I was having lots of fun doing this until pretzel #10, after that it got old and I was ready to be done.

8. While you are shaping your dough, you should be heating up 8 cups of water. Dissolve the baking soda in the water. You don't want the water to boil, just be really hot.

9. Once all the dough is all shaped, dip each pretzel into the baking soda solution. Leave the pretzel in the water until it floats up the the top. When it is floating, take it out and place it on a greased cookie sheet and sprinkle with salt. I did six, baked them, and then prepped the other 6 while the first batch was baking.

9. Bake at 450 degrees for 8 minutes. Right when they come out, brush each pretzel with butter and remove from the pan.

The recipe yields 12 large pretzels, unless your 4 year-old decides he needs to make a pizza out of one of the balls. Yum.

Enjoy. We sure did.