Yield: 8 pretzels

Baking Soda Substitute for Pretzels (Baked Soda Bath)

Baked baking soda, washing soda, lye, baking powder and egg wash compared one by one, with the honest food-grade answer and a full soft German pretzel recipe for 8.

Prep Time30 minutes

Cook Time20 minutes

Rising and resting1 hour 40 minutes

Total Time2 hours 30 minutes

Ingredients

Dough

• 1 1/4 cups warm water, 296 ml
• 2 teaspoons dried yeast, about 6 g by our conversion
• 2 teaspoons brown sugar, about 9 g by our conversion
• 2 tablespoons bread flour, about 17 g by our conversion; goes in with the yeast
• 3 cups bread flour, about 408 g by our conversion
• 2 teaspoons salt, about 12 g by our conversion, counted as table salt

Baked baking soda bath

• 1/4 cup food-grade, aluminum-free baking soda, baked, about 56 g before baking by our conversion; bake it first, see the steps
• 10 cups boiling water, about 2.4 L by our conversion

To finish

• coarse pretzel salt, optional; not counted in the nutrition

Instructions

Bake the soda

1. Bake the baking soda. Heat the oven to 250 F (about 120 C by our conversion). Spread 1/4 cup of baking soda in a non-metallic dish and bake it for 1 hour. German Girl in America says to make it 1 to 2 days ahead. Let it cool, and keep it away from children and pets.

Dough

1. Start the yeast. Stir the yeast, brown sugar and 2 tablespoons of the bread flour into the warm water. Leave it until it looks foamy.
2. Mix and knead. Add the salt and the 3 cups of bread flour and mix into a dough. Knead until it is smooth and elastic. The source page has the exact knead time, and we do not quote a number we have not checked.
3. Let it rise. Cover the dough and let it rise until it has doubled in size. The recipe takes about 2 hours 30 minutes in all.
4. Divide and shape. Divide the dough into 8 equal pieces, roll each into a rope and twist it into a pretzel shape. The finished pretzels are about 6 inches across.

Bath and bake

1. Make the bath. Heat the oven to 400 F (about 200 C by our conversion). In a non-aluminum pot, bring 10 cups of water to a boil, then stir in the 1/4 cup of baked baking soda.
2. Dip. Lower one pretzel at a time into the boiling bath for 30 seconds on each side. Lift it out with a slotted spoon.
3. Rinse (added step). Dip each pretzel briefly in a bowl of cool plain water, then set it on a parchment-lined sheet. German Girl in America has no rinse. This step is added from Brod and Taylor and America's Test Kitchen, which rinse to avoid a bitter crust. Brod and Taylor uses about 1.5 L of cool water per rinse.
4. Salt and rest. Sprinkle coarse salt over the pretzels if you like, then let them rest for 5 minutes.
5. Bake. Bake at 400 F for 10 minutes, rotate the sheet, then bake 10 minutes more. Cool on a wire rack.

Notes

Recipe follows German Girl in America (Soft German Pretzels without lye): dough, 1/4 cup baked soda in 10 cups of boiling water, 30 seconds per side, 5 minute rest, 400 F for 10 minutes, rotate, 10 more. We reworded it and added a rinse step.

The source gives a total time of 2 hours 30 minutes. Our split into prep, cooking and rest is an estimate. Baking the soda (1 hour) is not counted in it.

Cup-to-gram and teaspoon-to-gram figures are our conversions. We do not know the weight of baked soda per cup, so the 56 g is the weight of the soda before baking.

Nutrition values are our estimates, calculated from typical USDA FoodData Central values, per 1 of 8 pretzels. They count the dough only, with the salt taken as table salt. Sodium picked up from the bath and any coarse salt on top is not counted.