"Game Night" and Pigs in a Duvet

So, last Friday evening Mrs K and I got together with some dear friends for some board gaming and dinner.  Well, I couldn't go over empty handed and a bottle of purchased wine just doesn't cut it in our book.  So, when I cook for a Pot Luck or the like I usually cook what I want to eat for the evening.  I know, selfish.  Last Friday, I was in the mood for some Pigs in a Blanket cause what's better than a sausage wrapped in pastry?  I don't generally like to mess with classics like cocktail wieners and Pilsbury Crescent rolls.  Isn't that great that Pillsbury went ahead and renamed one of the greatest French pastries?  I'm sure they didn't ask France for their blessing on that one.  Dennis Leary had a comedy bit about Burger King doing the same with their Cross'anwich.  Anyhow, I find some satisfaction in putting my own twist on some classics.  I did go through a pretzel baking phase at home and knew I had a recipe for them some where so I decided to wrap those cocktail wienies in pretzel dough and serve them with a honey mustard.  Sounded good to me.  So, off to the grocery I went and got some "goods."

This is how they went down:

 This is a proofed, basic pretzel dough with butter as the fat.  I don't think that it really crisps up that well.  I may have to modify the dough recipe a bit next time:

 Rolled out and cut into rectangles with the aid of a pizza cutter.  I knew that that thing would come in handy one day:

Okay, so now that the wiener is wrapped in dough I put them into a pot of just simmering water with baking soda in it.  Back in the old days, pretzels were dunked in a bath of a lye solution.  Now, the only lye that had, uh.....lying around was in a bag of concrete mix I have in the garage.  I didn't feel like poisoning anyone that night so I opted for baking soda.  So, lye is an akali. So is baking soda.  What an alkaline bath does is give a pretzel a nice sheen, crust and that distinctive metallic-y flavor pretzels have.

Once they have been dunked for about 30 seconds, I place them on a cooling rack to dry off a bit and give them an egg wash (equal parts egg and water) to get them nice and brown and so that the salt I sprinkle on them have a chance to stick to them.

Very coarse sea salt.  This stuff is salty.  Much more so than Kosher so be light handed.

I felt that a little sweetness would be nice with the sausage and sea salt and I had this stuff laying around so I decided to sprinkle it on top liberally. It is Rock Maple Sugar.  It's great on Bagels as well:

I baked these on a silpat pan liner.  I think that if one were to bake them on the cooling rack you would have a heck of a time getting them out of the pan intact:

What to do with left over pretzel dough?  Why not twist up some pretzels:

Out of the oven to cool on a rack so they don't get soggy from the steam:

Golden, Brown, Cracklin'

A little honey mustard?

There you have it, Pretzel wrapped Pigs in a Blanket, or as a guest at the dinner called them:  "Pigs in a Duvet"  That sounds CLASSY, don't it?  These turned out well.  I think that the sausage created too much moisture being encased in dough.  They just didn't have the correct texture for my taste.  Next time, I will leave out the fat in the dough recipe.  Again, pretzel dough recipes can be found on line.  I hope that this inspires you to try it.