The Farmhouse Table | Chickens in the Road

Jun
17

We just had two days of workshops here, with cheesemaking, soapmaking, and baking. One of the attendees at the baking day asked about homemade soft pretzels. I took up the challenge and here’s what I came up with–and they came out delicious!

Start with a batch of Grandmother Bread dough.

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How to make Grandmother Bread:

1 1/2 cups warm water
1 teaspoon yeast
2 tablespoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 1/2 cups flour

In a large bowl, combine water, yeast, and sugar. Let sit five minutes. Stir in salt and first cup of flour with a heavy spoon. Add more flour a little at a time, stirring until dough becomes too stiff to continue stirring easily. Add a little more flour and begin kneading. The amount of flour is approximate–your mileage may vary! Continue adding flour and kneading until the dough is smooth and elastic. Let dough rise in a greased, covered bowl until doubled. Uncover bowl; sprinkle in a little more flour and knead again.

Attendees at the baking workshop, playing with dough:

Divide dough in half, then divide each half again. Keep dividing until you have eight to ten pieces, depending on size pretzels desired. Shape into pretzels.

Set pretzels aside to rise slightly while bringing a pot of water to boil. Drop pretzels into pot, boiling several at a time, for about 30 seconds to a minute.

Drain then place on greased baking sheets.

Brush tops of pretzels with an egg wash. (Several egg whites and a little bit of water.) Sprinkle with coarse salt. (Or cinnamon sugar!)

Bake at 400 degrees for about 20 minutes or until lightly browned–don’t overbake or they won’t be soft.

These turned out delicious and tasted–really!–just like pretzels! We were so proud.

See this recipe at Farm Bell Recipes and save it to your recipe box.
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Posted by Suzanne McMinn | Permalink

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Jun
7

I’ve been back to baking more lately with Weston home and a male mouth to feed in the house. Morgan and I don’t do too good at going through baking efforts–every time I make cookies, most of them go to school with her. We love peanut butter cookies here, and these muffins taste like peanut butter cookies–though not as sweet. If you skip the sugar on top, you could serve these with supper!

Or stick ‘em in a bowl with some vanilla ice cream and call it dessert. Versatile!

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Peanut Butter Cookie Muffins:

2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/3 cups milk
2/3 cup peanut butter (smooth or crunchy)
1/3 cup brown sugar, packed
1/4 cup butter or margarine, melted
2 eggs
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup roasted peanuts, salted or unsalted (optional)

Combine all the ingredients except for the peanuts and stir to combine.

Add peanuts.

Spoon into greased muffin cups, filling about two-thirds. I used a giant muffins pan, which was a mistake because the muffins are so big, I can only eat half of one at a time!

Bake at 400-degrees for 10-20 minutes, until done, depending on the size of the muffin cups in the pan you’re using.

If you want, melt some more butter and brush or drizzle over the tops of the muffins then sprinkle sugar over them. Shake off excess sugar. Or not.

You can freeze these and take them out individually, and they make handy breakfast. And are delicious!

Who needs a cookie? Have a cookie muffin!