Fully cooked sausages, spicy or bland, to wrap in dough for pretzel sausages or pretzel bites
OR meat & cheese sandwich fillings for pretzel buns
Mustards and spreads to accompany
Instructions
In a large bowl, combine water, yeast, and sugar.
Add 1 cup flour.
Add in oil and salt and 1 more cup of flour. Stir to combine.
Add enough flour to make a smooth, elastic dough (slightly tacky is fine). Knead dough a few times in the bowl.
Cover bowl and let dough rise until doubled (about 1 hour).
Pre-heat oven to 475 degrees. Grease baking sheets.
Bring the 12 cups of water to a boil in a large stock pot. SLOWLY add in baking soda (it will foam so go slow!!). Keep water simmering.
Gently punch down dough and divide in to 6 or 12 pieces (depending on size of pretzel you want).
Roll each piece of dough out to an 12-18″ rope. Shape in to pretzel shape and pinch ends to close up. OR, use a dough rope to wrap up a link or smaller piece of sausage, encasing it completely and pinching the ends to secure. Repeat with remaining dough and sausages.
Boil each pretzel for 10-15 seconds, making sure all sides are boiled.
Place pretzels on greased baking sheets, 1 inch apart.
Cover pretzels and let rest for 5 minutes.
Whisk together egg yolk and water and then brush on top of pretzels. Sprinkle salt on pretzels.