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Cheddar Cheese And Onion Pretzel Bread

January 23, 2009 by Aparna Balasubramanian 37 Comments

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After doing a lot of baking last month, I had given my oven (and myself) a two week baking break. It wasn’t easy to ignore the way my oven seemed to be asking me when I was going to get back to keeping it company. So I finally gave in and baked some Grissini, and that was it.

However, the looming deadline for Bread Baking Day this month (how could I miss that?) got me back to thinking about this month’s BBD theme which is “Bread with Cheese“. I chanced on a recipe for Cheddar Cheese Pretzel Bread on a discussion forum and it sounded perfect to me.

There are two ways of making pretzel bread, it seems. One way is to make them like pretzels by making pretzel shaped rolls putting them into boiling water to which baking soda has been added and then taking them out to bake them like bread.

The other way, which I have used here, is to shape the dough into a big pretzel and then bake it. It would also be difficult to follow the pretzel making method here because of the size of this bread.

I halved the original recipe and made a few additions and subtractions to suit our tastes. This includes leaving out the egg, adding some crushed black pepper and substituting one and quarter cups of flour with whole wheat flour. I am reproducing the halved recipe below.

Cheddar Cheese And Onion Pretzel Bread
Print Recipe
After doing a lot of baking last month, I had given my oven (and myself) a two week baking break. It wasn't easy to ignore the way my oven seemed to be asking me when I was going to get back to keeping it company. So I finally gave in and baked some Grissini, and that was it.
  • Coursebreads
  • Cuisineglobal vegetarian
Servings
10 portion
Servings
10 portion
Cheddar Cheese And Onion Pretzel Bread
Print Recipe
After doing a lot of baking last month, I had given my oven (and myself) a two week baking break. It wasn't easy to ignore the way my oven seemed to be asking me when I was going to get back to keeping it company. So I finally gave in and baked some Grissini, and that was it.
  • Coursebreads
  • Cuisineglobal vegetarian
Servings
10 portion
Servings
10 portion
Ingredients
  • 1/4 cup onion finely chopped
  • 1 1/2 tsps butter
  • 2 tsps yeast dry active
  • 1 1/2 tsps sugar
  • 3/4 cup water warm
  • 1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
  • 1 1/4 cups whole wheat flour
  • 1 cup cheddar cheese grated sharp
  • 1 tsp dried Italian herbs , crushed
  • 1 1/2 tsps black pepper crushed
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1/2 tsp salt sesame seeds coarse or some white (optional)
Servings: portion
Instructions
  1. In a pan, sautxe9 the onions in butter till soft but not brown. Keep aside to cool a bit.
  2. Add the sugar and yeast to the warm water, stir and allow to prove. In a mixing bowl (or processor bowl), put the sautxe9ed onion, cheese, flours, Italian herbs and salt. Mix (or pulse) a couple of times and add the yeast mixture.
  3. Knead very well, adding more water if necessary, till a moderately stiff dough which is smooth and elastic is obtained. Shape into a ball and place in a greased bowl, coating the ball with oil by turning it round in the bowl. Cover and allow the dough to double in volume (about an hour or so).
  4. Deflate the dough and turn it out onto a lightly floured surface, letting it rest for 10 minutes. Roll the dough out into a 24" long smooth rope. Place it on a greased baking sheet and shape into a large pretzel shape. Moisten the ends of the pretzel and tuck them underneath to seal.
  5. Cover and allow to rise till almost double (about half an hour). Brush the top of the bread with cold milk and sprinkle coarse salt or white sesame seeds if preferred.
  6. Bake at 190C for about 40 minutes till golden brown and the bread sounds hollow when tapped. If the bread is browning too much, cover it loosely with aluminium foil during the last 20 minutes in the oven. Cool completely on a rack.
  7. It is important to use a sharp cheddar cheese to make this bread for the flavour of the cheese to really come through in this bread. Baking this bread not only guarantees a bread full of flavour but an added bonus of heavenly aroma of warm cheese and bread baking in your oven.
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Filed Under: Breads

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Raaga says

    January 23, 2009 at 7:48 am

    it is too cold here to make any yeasty stuff… for later… 🙂 this looks lovely. Can’t you send stuff through the courier?

    Reply
  2. Happy Cook says

    January 23, 2009 at 8:03 am

    Wowo the pretzel look beautiful and so yummy delicous. I have never made them.Should try them once as itlooks so yummy delicous.

    Reply
  3. SMN says

    January 23, 2009 at 9:42 am

    Aparna looks delioucs and just feel like grabing it 🙂

    Reply
  4. pigpigscorner says

    January 23, 2009 at 11:24 am

    Delicious! I really have to try baking bread!

    Reply
  5. HoneyB says

    January 23, 2009 at 12:36 pm

    It is beautiful and delicious I am sure!

    Reply
  6. sra says

    January 23, 2009 at 1:20 pm

    It looks so nice and symmetrical. Love the many sesame seeds sprinkled on top.

    Reply
  7. Asha says

    January 23, 2009 at 1:40 pm

    Making Pretzel shaped bread is a great idea, looks perfect and yummy! :))

    Reply
  8. Maya says

    January 23, 2009 at 2:23 pm

    That looks too good to eat! I am sure it tasted wonderful!

    Reply
  9. Sunshinemom says

    January 23, 2009 at 4:11 pm

    I had read about huge pretzels and now I have the recipe and it looks good too!

    Reply
  10. Soma says

    January 23, 2009 at 8:59 pm

    One wonder after another Aparna:-)

    Reply
  11. Ashwini Kenchanna says

    January 23, 2009 at 11:28 pm

    lovely bread. Very tempting to eat that..Nice pretzel shape tooo

    Reply
  12. Yasmeen says

    January 23, 2009 at 11:57 pm

    Wonderful! Pretzel bread was not known to me,the onion and cheddar does make it very flavorful.I have a bread in mind for BBD,hopefully I’ll bake it before the deadline

    Reply
  13. Smitha says

    January 24, 2009 at 12:28 am

    That is a show stopper!

    Reply
  14. Kumudha says

    January 24, 2009 at 1:00 am

    Bread looks great! Panchrathan dal looks so delicious. Thanks for sharing the recipe.

    Reply
  15. Curry Leaf says

    January 24, 2009 at 2:07 am

    Wow and wow.I was waiting for your Cheese bread .I love all the breads you make Aparna.You seem so effortless baker.For me,I love baking,but the waiting for doubling and the actual baking time is spent in nail biting.Well I made something for BBD.Will be posting it next week.

    Reply
  16. Jamie says

    January 24, 2009 at 3:05 am

    Aparna, this looks so good. I could eat this for a meal! Happy Belated 2009!

    Reply
  17. Arundathi says

    January 24, 2009 at 4:54 am

    looks gorgeous, aparna!

    Reply
  18. Cham says

    January 24, 2009 at 5:06 am

    This one is a huge Pretzel! Looks so good the shape and bread!

    Reply
  19. Maya says

    January 24, 2009 at 5:14 am

    Thats very neat, a pretzel shaped bread..Looks nice and yummy..

    Reply
  20. sunita says

    January 24, 2009 at 11:02 am

    BEBeautiful entry, Aparna 🙂

    Reply
  21. Rachel says

    January 24, 2009 at 11:19 am

    Its shaped so well and the end result looks gorgeous….will get back to ours very soon 🙂

    Reply
  22. Passionate About Baking says

    January 24, 2009 at 3:19 pm

    Aparna, these are torturing me & the weather is till too cold & the yeast will not rise. Beautiful bread. Am so glad you are taking advantage of good Goa weather!

    Reply
  23. FoodyGuru (Srimathi) says

    January 24, 2009 at 5:32 pm

    Hi aparna,How are you doing? Its been a while since I really looked at blogs. Nice looking bread. I am amazed at the bread that you bake all the time. Wonderful.

    Reply
  24. Aparna says

    January 24, 2009 at 5:48 pm

    Thanks. I had some anxious moments when the shaping the bread initially. Its one thing to shape small pretzels and another to do it with bread dough! But it worked out on the third attempt.:)Raaga, if they accept food, I’d be more than happy to send you a parcel.Yasmeen and Sweatha, I’ll wait to see your BBD bread.Thank you, Jamie and same to you.Arundathi, I’m waiting to see you back at baking.Looking forward to that Rachel.:)I’ve been seeing how cold it is in Delhi, on the TV, Deeba.Yes, it is quite cool and very pleasant here.Fine Srimathi. Thanks, its been quite a while. Looks like you’ve been very busy.

    Reply
  25. Bharti says

    January 24, 2009 at 5:59 pm

    A beautiful job Aparna. It seriously looks amazing.

    Reply
  26. PG says

    January 24, 2009 at 8:14 pm

    Beautiful! Like always. And I like the “knot” you have made.A very interesting recipe. But, there is one thing I wanted to tell you about the bakig soda. It is actually caustic soda (NaOH), yes it really is! That is what makes “bretzel” bretzel. That is what gives it this dark colour. It is dipped into the diluted solution of the lye. I looked up a link, here at Wiki.

    Reply
  27. PG says

    January 24, 2009 at 8:18 pm

    I just read the link myself, and you are actually right too. :DTraditionally one used lye and, I guess, now a days to make it less dangerous baking soda is used. So, I also learnt something. 🙂

    Reply
  28. veggie belly says

    January 25, 2009 at 2:09 am

    Thats some seriously gorgeous bread. I love bread with lots of flavor added, especially cheese 🙂

    Reply
  29. Aparna says

    January 25, 2009 at 5:15 am

    Yes PG, you are right.I have made pretzels (just never posted it!) and since lye can be dangerous to work with, baking soda is the acceptable option.:)

    Reply
  30. karuna says

    January 25, 2009 at 8:53 pm

    I love pretzels. this one looks so fluffy. I Just want to take a bite into it. def will try this one out.

    Reply
  31. Jude says

    January 28, 2009 at 3:30 am

    Need to try making this… Haven’t tried a pretzel recipe with a good amount of ww flour.

    Reply
  32. Susan/Wild Yeast says

    January 29, 2009 at 3:46 pm

    I loe loe the shape of that loaf!

    Reply
  33. Susan/Wild Yeast says

    January 29, 2009 at 3:47 pm

    Oops, that’s loVe loVeMy V is broken 🙁

    Reply
  34. Eva says

    February 5, 2009 at 11:57 am

    That looks just wonderful – your photo is so well lit! And it reminds me that I’m out of bread and – being a bit sick – I won’t be able to bake…however, that looks just like the right thing to nourish me!

    Reply
  35. gine says

    February 9, 2009 at 11:10 am

    Aparna, that looks delicous, compliments! 🙂

    Reply
  36. Sara says

    February 10, 2009 at 5:04 pm

    This looks great. I also made pretzels for this challenge. I love this sound of this recipe, it is going on my to do list.

    Reply
  37. scraps says

    February 18, 2009 at 12:25 am

    This bread looks very beautiful! I should try this one.

    Reply

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I'm Aparna and My Diverse Kitchen is my ovo-lacto vegetarian food blog where you'll find recipes, food stories & photography. I've been blogging since 2007 and believe the kitchen, and the dining table (by extension) is really the heart of a home. Read More...

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