Canned Biscuit Pretzel Bites

This shortcut recipe for Canned Biscuit Pretzel Bites uses a can of refrigerated biscuit dough to make warm, crispy, doughy pretzels that taste just like the ones from the mall!

Bread is just about one of the best things in the world.  And when bread is in the form of a pretzel it can be pretty dang delicious!  But, what if I told you that you can make these perfectly satisfying pretzel bites, previously inhaled only once a year at the county fair, with just a can of refrigerated biscuit dough? It’s for real. And it’s life changing.

I have been in the kitchen testing this recipe for a while now after seeing something similar. Being thorough, I tested canned pizza crust, canned French bread, biscuits, and that refrigerated raw pizza dough that you can find in the bakery section of many grocery stores.

While the canned French bread and pizza crust yielded a beautiful bake, the texture and flavor just wasn’t quite right. The super market bakery pizza dough was amazing – perfect texture and bake which is fully due in part to it containing yeast, unlike the canned varieties. Unfortunately, not everyone has access to a supermarket with an extensive bakery that offers ready made pizza dough. And you know that I want y’all to be able to get your hands on everything I use in my recipes, so we passed on that. If you do find that, I would definitely say to use it in place of the biscuits in this recipe.

We did find that canned biscuits ended up giving us a light and fluffy bite with a crispy exterior. That combined with the pretty much universal availability made it the right choice for these.

When it comes to turning this dough into pretzels, there’s a crucial step that can’t be skipped and that’s a quick dip in baking soda water. This helps the pretzel get its dark brown color and unique flavor. Now, traditional pretzels were dipped in a lye solution. Yeah, the stuff that they use to make soap and clean drains – just a different strength.

Opting to go with baking soda gives us similar results without having to deal with caustic lye. Now, baking soda water is still caustic, but much less corrosive. Still, you might want to dip your pretzels using a slotted wooden or stainless steel spoon as it will tarnish aluminum services. I know all that sounds scary, but it’s not. I just don’t want you ruining your aluminum pans.

Traditionally, the dip is into boiling water, but it can be a little intimidating and messy. We tested each of the different doughs with a dip in boiling baking soda water and with slightly warm baking soda water. We found not much difference between the two methods and thought the warm dip was much easier.

After finding our favorite baked texture and method, we then tested again with either a melted butter or egg wash topped with salt.  The following recipe is our favorite combination. Let’s get into it!

What makes these pretzel bites so easy? By using canned biscuits in this easy recipe, we are avoiding the use of yeast. Yeast is a simple and readily available ingredient, but can be intimidating to bake with. Making sure you have the correct temperature and amount of water along with the rest time and kneading are additional steps that get cut out when you use these canned biscuits.   

Topping for a pretzel can vary widely! I am a simple man and enjoy the regular old plain salted pretzel, so we just used a coarse sea salt. You can even find special pretzel salt that has a lighter color and texture. (affiliate link) You could use everything bagel seasoning, poppy seeds, dried minced onion, or go for a sweeter finish with cinnamon! I included those instructions in the notes section of the recipe below.

Although they are perfect on their own, it’s easy to whip up my Honey Mustard Dressing recipe for dipping! Y’all enjoy!