Lace stars

Name: Lace stars
Prep time: 40 min
Cook time: 10 min
Total time: 60 min
Yield: 10
Cuisine: Switzerland
Ingredients: 100 g water; 10 g yeast | (fresh); 150 g white flour; 4 g lard; 300 g white flour; 20 g sunflower oil; 10 g salt; 6 eggs, | boiled; 60 g mayonnaise; 1 g Aromat; 1 pinch of paprika; 6 bacon strips; 10 g onion sprouts

Stuffed pretzel stars

Who says it always has to be sweet? Not us, anyway! After all, amongst all those sweet treats, you need something savoury every now and then. But as we still want to stay true to the Christmas theme, we thought we’d make some delicious star-shaped pretzel rolls. These are filled with a delicious, homemade egg salad and garnished with a little fried bacon and spring onions. You really must give this recipe a go! It’s also brilliant as an aperitif. All you need to do is cut the rolls out a bit smaller, otherwise your guests will be full before the main meal even starts.

Key figures

Quantity: 10 pieces

Baking time: approx. 10 minutes

Difficulty: Medium

Shelflife: 3 days

Pre-dough

Water		100 g
Yeast \| fresh		10 g
plain flour		150 g

Main dough

Ready-made pre-ferment
Water		100 g
Yeast \| fresh		10 g
Baking malt		4 g
plain flour		300 g
Sunflower oil		20 g
Salt		10 g

Filling

Eggs \| boiled		6
Mayonnaise		60 g
Aromat		1 g
Paprika powder		1 pinch
bacon		6 strips
onion sprouts		10 g

Plastic dough towels

Ready-to-ship quantity: more than 20 pieces

CHF 19.90

Fermentation box, 39 x 29 x 6 cm

Ready-to-ship quantity: 19

CHF 29.90

White flour, 1 kg

Ready-to-ship quantity: more than 20 pieces

CHF 4.50

Making the pre-dough

Mix the water, yeast and white flour together in a bowl, cover the mixture with a plastic cling film and leave it to stand at room temperature for an hour.

and so it goes on

Place the pre-dough into a dough mixer fitted with dough hooks. In a one-litre container, mix together the water, yeast and baking malt, then add this mixture to the pre-dough in the dough mixer.

Now add the flour and let the machine mix everything together well on a low setting for 2–3 minutes. Once the dough has firmed up slightly, you can add the oil in a thin stream and let the dough mix for a further 3 minutes on a low setting. Once everything has combined well, knead the dough thoroughly again on a high setting for about 8–10 minutes. As soon as the dough becomes more elastic, add the salt towards the end of the kneading time and mix it in briefly.

Cover the finished dough with a plastic dough sheet and leave it to rest at room temperature for 15–20 minutes. You can, of course, reuse the plastic dough sheets. Simply wipe them briefly with a damp cloth and they’ll be ready for the next use.

Roll out the dough to a thickness of 1 cm using a rolling pin, then take a 10 cm star-shaped cookie cutter. If you’d prefer to serve the lye stars as appetisers, we recommend using a 7–8 cm cutter instead.

Cut out the stars and place them on a baking tray lined with baking paper. Simply knead the remaining dough back together and roll it out again until it’s all used up.

Cover the stars with a tea towel and place them in the fridge for 30 minutes.

Baking malt 500 g

Ready-to-ship quantity: more than 20 pieces

CHF 16.90

Rolling pin set 6 pieces

Ready-to-ship quantity: more than 20 pieces

CHF 12.90

Cookie cutter set stars, 10 pieces

Ready-to-ship quantity: 8

CHF 32.90

Important points to bear in mind when making lye and baking

Preheat the oven to 210 ºC (fan) and mix the lye solution.

When working with lye, you must wear protective gloves and safety goggles. Lye is corrosive and can cause serious injury. We don’t want to scare you – you definitely shouldn’t be afraid – but it’s certainly a good idea to treat lye with a certain amount of respect.

To mix the lye solution, simply dissolve the lye pellets (20 g) in cold water (500 ml). Important: Never pour the water into a bowl containing the lye pellets – always do it the other way round.

Now take your chilled pretzel stars out of the fridge and carefully dip them into the lye solution (don’t just drop them in, otherwise the lye will splash all over the kitchen).
Take your pretzels out of the lye again, place them back on the baking tray and sprinkle them with a little pretzel salt.
Use a pair of scissors to make a cut in the centre of each point of the stars. This is very important, as otherwise the stars will burst open uncontrollably during baking and won’t look nice anymore.

Place the finished pretzels in the preheated oven for 2 minutes. After 2 minutes, you need to add a little steam to the oven. This is best done using a spray bottle. Then bake the stars for a further 8 minutes, until they have taken on that typical, perfect colour and are baked through nicely.