My own thought on the origin of pretzels, and it’s not original, is that they were invented in Central Europe, somewhere around the region of what is now known as Germany. That said, this is absolutely not how it happened. Frankfurt, located in the German State of Hesse, has been an important commercial hub for […]
READ ONIt’s awfully hard to date the pretzel. That’s because its main ingredients — flour, water, salt, yeast — are the basis for just about every bread product known to man. Its shape, on the other hand, is quite distinctive. Perhaps a little too much so. Why? Because in an effort to make themselves sound intelligent […]
READ ONOf all the baked goods I’ve written about, I don’t think I’ve ever encountered a food-historical conundrum quite like the pretzel. No other foodstuff I’ve encountered has had so many — and so many bogus — origin stories attached to it. Part of the reason is surely because it’s so old. The pretzel has been […]
READ ONWell I certainly stirred up the ol’ hornets’ nest yesterday, didn’t I? Turned out there was a whole world of hurt in that shoe sale joke. (For me). I guess that’ll learn me, at least until the next time. Given all the stress of a big interview and lots of comments, I can’t tell you […]
READ ON…is pretty much what I get every year when I see a food columnist parroting more of the same old hot cross bun claptrap. There are probably as many erroneous, exaggerated, or just plain made-up stories about the hot cross bun as there are about the pretzel. The most oft-cited myth goes like this: the hot cross bun is descended from pre-Christian peoples, for whom carving a cross on a round bread was a deeply mystical act connected to food and/or blood sacrifice. The symbolism, having to do with the progression of the sun
READ ONReader T wants to know why the mooncake crust recipe below calls for baking soda AND Chinese lye water. It’s an excellent question and I believe the answer is twofold. First, an extremely alkaline dough will brown up more readily. I mentioned Maillard reactions in a post a few days ago. One aspect of these mysterious browning reactions that I failed to mention is that they happen faster in an alkaline environment. It’s one of the reasons breads like pretzels and bagels are dipped in a lye solution before they’re baked. Chinese mooncakes don’t spend much time in the oven, so to get even a mildly browned appearance the pH needs to be fairly high. I don’t know what the pH of Chinese lye water is, but it’s must be higher than that of baking soda (9). Otherwise, why use it?
READ ONReader Choi asks:
Joe, I understand that the browning of pumpernickel in the oven is caused by the Maillard reaction. It is my understanding that Maillard reactions only happen over 300 degrees Fahrenheit. If you’re baking pumpernickel at 225, how is Maillard browning possible?
That’s a puzzler isn’t it, Choi? Maillard reactions are so little understood. What is known is that they can happen at surprisingly low temperatures. They happen fastest over 300 degrees, there’s no question about that, but they can happen at far lower
READ ON
Joe, I don’t like white bread. Yes you do. If you like bread, you like white bread. You might not like it when it’s pre-sliced and sold in plastic bags at the supermarket, but you like it in other shapes and circumstances, I’ll bet you money. If you like baguettes, focaccia, pita bread, fougasse, bagels, brioche, flour tortillas, naan, bialys, pretzels, pizza, pancakes, matzoh, ciabatta, sourdough bread, English muffins, olive bread, chapati, challah, lavash, breadsticks or dinners rolls, you like white bread. In fact if you prefer wheat or rye I’d still argue that you like white bread, because if that loaf is at all light and fluffy, it’s probably made with a least 50% white flour.
READ ON
Like a lot of sort-of laminated pastries, it’s hard to put your finger on just what it is that makes kringle so delicious. It’s not a croissant. It’s not a coffee cake. You think: it’s sort of like both of them but it has it own special, oh…I don’t know what. Then the plumped raisins and hints of cardamom kick in and well…you’re hooked.
READ ONIt’s a shape, at least in Denmark. An upside-down (to us Americans at any rate) pretzel. This symbol, which is usually cast in gold with a crown on top, means “bakery” for the Danes. It’s a guild symbol, one of the few that are still in use in Europe these days.
You find this generic shape applied to any number of sweet and savory baked items in Denmark. There are salty kringles (what we know as pretzels), sugar kringles (cookies or pretzels sprinkled with sugar), kringle breads and of course the large kringle pastry we’re talking about this week.
READ ON