I don’t have a lot of books on the subject, but obviously I can only recommend Martha Stewart’s book “Biscuits, shortbread cookies, the bible of very small cakes”, even if it now costs the modest sum of a hundred euros on the second-hand market. In short, if you ever come across it, leaf through it, it’s cool!
Sweet pretzels
The pretzel is a preparation that is basically a reference to a savory brioche version, poached in water, then baked in the oven (on the same principle as a bagel in the end).
Over time, the concept of pretzels is also used to decline its emblematic shape from Alsatian and Germanic cultures. Pretzel at the origin of the word comes mainly from its shape since it looks like small “arms”.
In our case, don’t expect to have a super sweet biscuit, because here we have remained in the spirit of the small biscuits found in the boxes of the Dr. Oetker brand: something we don’t know not too much if it’s sweet or savory.
The recipe has little sugar, a little salt, and it took me a while to decide whether to like it or not.
To tell the truth, I also took a few liberties with the recipe from which I was largely inspired, because I couldn’t find any granulated sugar with large grains. On the market, you can easily find powdered sugar, and “crystal” sugar, but granulated sugar is a sugar where you see the grains like small pieces of glass, which tends to really make more small chips. which can be clearly seen by eye. And in fact it melts less and allows it to look pretty.
BRIEF, since I didn’t have any, I preferred to leave them bare, but in fact, it’s less sweet and simple granulated sugar could have been enough!
To make the cookies, it will give you hints of your modeling clay sessions! To calibrate the biscuits and have something equal, I start by making a long pudding, which I cut into 24 identical sections.
Then each cookie is lovingly shaped into a sausage long enough (about thirty centimeters) to be able to form them into adorable pretzels. The first are a bit risky, but when you know roughly what it should look like, you end up getting the hang of it!
Then, we will brown them then if we wish, add crystal sugar on top before baking. For my part, I chose to add a copper colored sugar to some of them, I find it super cute (I found it at Zodio, and I advise you to read the labels carefully because the sprinkles and whatnot are for the mostly non-vegan depending on the brand).
Decorate your Christmas pretzels
I find that these cookies can very well stand out on their side with a less sweet side, and therefore temper the rest of a cookie box.
Nevertheless, if you want sweet sweet cakes, you can therefore add sugar on top, but it is also possible to make them a little more festive by decorating them with chocolate!
I used a white chocolate that had been sent to me for testing by the weiss brand, but which is not intended for individuals. Too bad because he’s pretty cool. Regarding the vegan white chocolate that is easily found in organic stores in tablets, I do not find it suitable for this kind of work. If you want to keep the white chocolate format, I therefore advise you rather that of vantastic food or Linnolat, the must: it is very good raw material with a really adapted fluidity!
In dark chocolate, preferably also take “cover” chocolate richer in cocoa butter and which reacts better when it returns to its initial shape.
We melt the chocolate, we dip our cookies in it, and we can let our imagination run wild with sprinkles, nuggets, spices, in short, whatever you want to make your cocoa pretzels the cutest and most delicious in the world.
And if you wish, to make a pretty cookie box to offer, why not make cookies chocolate and tonka beansmall spice cookies in the shape of a man, or crinkles ?
Vegan Cocoa Pretzels
Ingredients
- 25 g cocoa raw, sugar free
- 280 g wheat flour T45
- 1 vs. coffee instant coffee or liquid vanilla extract
- 110 g margarine preferably in a wafer and not in a tray
- 50 g Granulated sugar
- 1/2 vs. coffee flower of salt
- 80 g soy yogurt
- 10 g water
- soy cream
Instructions
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In a bowl, weigh all the ingredients, except the yogurt, water and instant coffee.
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Work to obtain a sanding then add the yogurt.
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Dilute the coffee in water, preferably lukewarm or even hot (it’s easier to dissolve that way), then stir into the dough.
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Work a little and check the texture: it should be uniform and easy to work with, and not stick at all! If it is not thick enough, you can add a little water, but carefully, going very gradually between each addition.
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Make a large sausage of dough, and divide into 2, then 4, then 2 then 3 so as to obtain 24 small sections of identical format: this type of manipulation saves you from weighing. It’s not to the nearest gram but it allows you to have a certain regularity without bothering to weigh and without realizing at the end that we are missing 12 cookies! In short, calibration is life.
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Then make sausages with each piece (in life, there’s meditation, then there’s biscuits), then form the pretzels on a baking sheet with parchment paper. The cookies will not move too much during baking so you can have them cohabit with a certain proximity without problems.
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Take a brush and some soy cream, and brown all the pretzels (another meditative activity).
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Add granulated sugar on top as desired.
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Bake at 160°C for about thirty minutes.
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Once out of the oven, let cool completely.
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If you wish, melt the chocolate of your choice (preferably couverture chocolate which is much more suitable for this type of work), and place on a guitar sheet (a thin plastic sheet suitable for chocolate work) or parchment paper, and add small vermicelli or sugar decorations on top if desired.
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As for the work of the chocolate, remember to let the chocolate drip well before depositing the biscuit so as not to create a huge pile of chocolate which would be a little hard to chew.
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The biscuits keep for a while, but I advise you not to exceed 15 days for taste reasons more than food safety.
