Pretzels.

A little while back I ordered this pretzel cookbook, titled The Pretzel Cookbook by Priscilla Warren.

Since my mid-semester break is drawing to an end I thought I would try out one of the recipes. Of course, while at first this seemed like it would be easy, it turns out that you need to plan ahead and give yourself a 24 hour period in which to make them. And so the process began...

Deciding to make a basic pretzel, I made the dough and then left in the refrigerator overnight to rest and let the yeast do it's thing.

Today I pulled the dough out and formed my pretzels. I decided on medium-sized pretzels thinking they would be nice - but let me tell you going the large-pretzel route would have been far more practical and easier when dealing with the dough.

After leaving the formed pretzels to rest some more, I finally got them in the oven. After all that effort they only take 8-10 minutes to bake. It really is true that making bread of any kind requires a great deal of patience, as the preparation itself takes forever!

Unable to decide what toppings to put on them, I decided on salt and poppyseeds. Despite the length of prep time required these pretzels are delicious, and are similar to the traditional New York style pretzel, making all that time and effort worth it :)