Pretzel Dogs

When Dan and I had our overnight camp out with people from his work, some of the other wives were talking about their love of Craig’s List and all of the great “furniture deals” they have found. One of the wives was talking about how she refinished a farm table for her backyard. It sounded fabulous!

I logged into the site late last week and found something that interested me. I’ve been looking for a distressed black dining room table with a leaf . You would think that would be a pretty easy thing to find. Sure, for$1000 plus – Crate and Barrel, Pottery Barn, Ballard Designs – no problem.

My Dad has refinished some pretty fabulous pieces for me over the years and I’ve been on the hunt at consignment stores to find another table project. He’s getting backed up with projects – refinishing a piano, a sewing table, tiled coffee table – I knew it was going to be a while.

I found a black table without a leaf – I was primarily interested in the wooden chairs – they looked pretty sturdy. I became more interested when I saw that the price for the table and 4 chairs was $115.00. I jumped at the deal. My parents lived close to the seller, so they went and checked out the dining set. It needed to be cleaned, had some scratches and marks – but they thought I would like it. They loaded it into their truck and even delivered it.

I got some new cleaning products, touched up the scratches and purchased some chair cushions and placemats and it was good to go. I snapped a quick photo with my iPhone. Sucky lighting, but I doubt anyone minds.

I am still on the hunt for a table with a leaf – but the chairs are definitely worth keeping – super comfortable, even without the pads. Now I need a lighter carpet to switch things up a bit. I even managed to sell my old table and chairs at a garage sale over the weekend – $225.00 – woohoo!

The First Meal…

My BFF Hilly joined me for my first meal at the new table. I found a recipe online for pretzel dogs. I’ve been obsessed with pretzel dough croissants and bread at the farmer’s market, so I wanted to see what I could do with the left over package of turkey dogs from the 4th of July. (My niece doesn’t like hamburgers, so I got them for her).

I found a recipe on the San Jose Examiner’s website from April 2010 in honor of National Pretzel Day. It was supposed to be an easy Auntie Anne’s Pretzel knock-off recipe.

The Ingredients:

1 Package of Hot Dogs
1 Can Pillsbury Refrigerated Breadstick Dough – 12 breadsticks
1 Cup Water
3 Tablespoons Baking Soda
Coarse Sea Salt

Preheat Oven to 400 degrees.

Spray a baking sheet with non-stick cooking spray (I didn’t use enough – give it a really good coating because mine still stuck a little bit)

Bring a large pot of water to a boil and drop in the hot dogs for 3-4 minutes. Remove and cool enough to handle.

Separate the refrigerated breadsticks. Starting at one end, leaving about an inch of hot dog exposed, wrap the dog with the dough.

Use the extra dough to make regular breadsticks – a package of dogs is 8 and you will have 4 extra, so twist 2 together to form two breadsticks.

Boil 1 cup of water and pour into a bowl large enough to fit a dough wrapped hot dog.

Add 3 tablespoons of baking soda to the boiling water and mix well – it will fizz up…

Dip each dough wrapped hot dog in the water/soda mixture for 30 seconds, turning so that all sides are coated.

The dough will start to unwrap a little bit, just re-wrap the ends if that happens. Place each dipped dog on the prepared baking sheet after dunking.

Sprinkle coarse salt over the tops of each pretzel dog. I definitely used too much, you really don’t need a lot due to the hot dogs already being pretty high in sodium.

Bake in the 400 degree oven until golden brown. They suggested 5-10 minutes – mine took the full 10 minutes. Watch carefully – check at 5, you don’t want the dough to burn.

Remove from oven and serve with your favorite hot dog condiments – We went with mustard.

I would make these again for sure. I’d just dial back the salt and I’d also use a different baking sheet and I’d coat it better. Definitely brought me back to “Pigs in a Blanket” – “Dogs in a Blanket” or whatever you called them as a kid in the 1970’s/80’s.

We had a great girl’s night out and I look forward to many more meals on my new Craig’s List find.