National Pretzel Day
April 26, 2018
Today, April 26, is a United States holiday that may be little known outside the state of Pennsylvania: National Pretzel Day. That’s right, those yummy, twisted German biscuits have their own appreciation day, and that aroma wafting from the kitchen is a fresh batch of pretzels to help you celebrate it. The holiday began in 2003 in Pennsylvania, a state that takes great pride in its pretzel cuisine and history. It was in the town of Lititz, in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, that baker Julius Sturgis began making the first commercial pretzels in the United States in 1861.
April 26 is National Pretzel Day in the United States. Credit: © Malinka Galina, Shutterstock
A pretzel is a type of German biscuit. Some pretzels are soft and doughy, others are brittle and hard, but almost all have a glazed, salted surface. (Did you know pretzels without salt are known as “baldies?”) According to tradition, the first pretzels were made in the early 600′s by European monks as a reward for children who learned their prayers. The original pretzel’s shape represented the crossed arms of a child praying. Pretzels were introduced to the United States in the 1700′s by German immigrants who became known as Pennsylvania Dutch. In German, pretzel is bretzel.
In the beginning, all pretzels were soft and doughy. Some people say the innovation of hard pretzels was the result of a forgotten batch of pretzels left in the oven too long. Regardless of how they began, hard pretzels are delicious too and they last longer on shelves. In fact, the vast majority of pretzels sold in the United States are the hard, crunchy kind. Soft pretzels, however, are still very popular in roadside food carts, at baseball parks, and other places where the the fresh-baked aroma is hard to ignore. Philadelphia is famous for its soft pretzels, and the city once had its own pretzel museum.
In Germany, kids once wore pretzels around their necks for good luck on New Year’s Day, and the pretzel is the emblem of the German Bakers’ Guild. In Switzerland, pretzels were once common wedding food—symbolizing “tying the knot.” Pretzels top some Christmas trees in Austria. In the Netherlands, pretzel history is recorded in the “bakery collection” of master painter Job Berckheyde (1630-1693). In the United States, pretzels were manufactured by hand until 1935, when the Reading (Pennsylvania) Pretzel Machinery Company introduced the first automated pretzel maker. Pennsylvania remains the American pretzel capital: 4 out of 5 U.S. pretzels are made in the state.
