Auntie Annes' Pretzels Copycat

Ingredients:

1. 2 cups milk
2. 1 1/2 Tablespoons active dry yeast (2 packets)
3. 6 Tablespoons packed light-brown sugar
4. 4 Tablespoons butter, at room temperature
5. 4 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, plus an up to an additional 1/2 cup as needed
6. 2 teaspoons fine salt
7. 1/3 cup baking soda
8. 3 cups warm water
9. coarse salt, to taste
10. 6 Tablespoons butter, melted

Directions:

• Warm milk in a microwave safe bowl in microwave (or alternately over stove top in a small saucepan) until temperature of milk reaches 110 degrees, about 1 1/2-2 minutes on HIGH power. Pour milk along with yeast into the bowl of an electric stand mixer and whisk together until yeast has dissolved, let rest 5 minutes. Add brown sugar, 4 teaspoons softened butter, 1 cup flour and 2 teaspoons fine salt to milk mixture and using the whisk attachment, stir until blended. Switch attachment to a dough hook, add remaining 3 1/2 cups flour and knead mixture on medium low speed until elastic. Mix in up to an additional 1/2 cup flour, as needed, until dough pulls away from the side of the bowl. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and allow dough to rise in warm place until doubled in size, about 1 hour.
• Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Line two baking sheets with Silpats or parchment paper (alternatley you could grease them). Punch dough down several times to release any air pockets. Divide dough 12 equal pieces (the easiest way to do this is to divide the dough in half, then divide the halves into halves then those into thirds). Cover divided dough loosely with plastic wrap (just to prevent a dry crust from forming on the outside) and roll each piece out into long, thin rope about 32-36 inches long (I found working on a non-floured to very very lightly floured surface worked best, I began with a lightly floured surface and realized it was much harder to get more stretch, plus it was much faster to roll them out when working on a less-no flour surface). Form dough rope into a pretzel shape.
• In a shallow bowl, whisk together baking soda and warm water then fully immerse pretzel into water mixture and allow excess water to drip off. Place on prepared baking sheet, reshape as needed and sprinkle to taste with coarse salt. Repeat this process with remaining dough. Bake pretzels in preheated oven 7-11 minutes until golden brown (note that you will likely only be able to cook 6 at a time among the two baking sheets) remove from oven and brush top and bottom of pretzel with melted butter. Serve warm. Reheat in microwave or in a warm oven once they've cooled, if desired.

~Recipe from cookingclassy.com