These cute soft pretzel bunny buns are a cute way to serve rolls for brunch or Easter dinner. I used my favorite soft pretzels recipe to make them and shaped each roll into an adorable bunny shape.
Even though my family doesn’t celebrate Easter, I wanted to make one Easter themed recipe this year. I really, really loved the bunny buns I made last year and it’s one of my favorite Easter recipes. I didn’t want to repeat the same thing, but I made something similar: soft pretzel bunnies!
These are great for Easter dinner or brunch, but I think you can make them all year, too. I love making cute animal-shaped rolls like turtle pretzels and chick-shaped rolls. And now I have these bunny pretzels so the trend continues.
Notes about Making Soft Pretzels
Ever since I discovered the best soft pretzel recipe, I love to make homemade pretzels. I’ve adapted that recipe to make many other soft pretzel recipes including these soft bunny pretzels I’m sharing today. If you’ve never tried making your own pretzels at home you should definitely try it. They take some time but they’re not complicated to make.
- Making pretzel dough is similar to other kinds of bread making. First, you combine flour and butter with water, yeast, sugar and salt. I use my stand mixer to make the dough which makes it very easy.
- Once the dough comes together you need to let it rise and once the dough has doubled in size you can shape the dough into bunnies.
How to Shape the Dough
For these bunny pretzels, I take a ping pong ball-sized amount of dough and shape it into an oval. Once all the dough balls are shaped they are ready to be boiled.
Boiling the dough for 30 seconds or so in a mixture of water and baking soda is what gives the pretzels their distinctive flavor and texture. You don’t want to skip the boiling step otherwise your pretzels won’t turn out right.
Since these are bunny-shaped rolls I used kitchen shears to cut the dough to create little ears. Do this before you bake them. You can see photos that show how to do this in my honey bunny buns recipe.
Once the bunny rolls are baked I used my edible decorating pen* to create the little eyes.
I am so pleased about how these came out. So cute and yummy tasting. I did have the hardest time eating them, though, because they were too cute. I ate them from the back side first so I didn’t have to see the two eyes.
*Some of the links contained in this post are affiliate links. Much like referral codes, this means I earn a small commission if you purchase a product I referred (at no extra charge to you).
Soft Pretzel Bunnies
Ingredients
- 3/4 cups warm water 110 to 115°F
- 1/2 tbsp sugar
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 1/8 tsp active dry yeast
- 2 1/4 cups all purpose flour
- 1 oz unsalted butter melted
- 1/3 cup baking soda
- 1 egg yolk
Instructions
- Combine the warm water, sugar and salt in the bowl of a stand mixer and sprinkle the yeast on top. Allow it to sit for about 5 minutes.
- Add the flour and butter and using the dough hook attachment, mix on low speed until well combined. Change to medium speed and knead about 5 minutes until the dough is smooth and pulls away from the side of the bowl.
- Remove the dough from the bowl, and place the dough in a glass bowl oiled with vegetable oil. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise in a warm place for approximately 50 to 55 minutes or until the dough has doubled in size.
- Take a chunk of dough about the size of a ping pong ball and roll into an oval shape. Repeat with remaining dough.
- Preheat the oven to 450°F. Fill a large saucepan with water. Bring the water to a boil and add the baking soda.
- Place the pretzels into the boiling water for 30 seconds, a few at a time. Make sure to gently place in and don't let the dough roll around too much in order to preserve the oval shape and so the dough doesn't get too wrinkled or bubbled. Remove them from the water using a large flat spatula. Place pretzels on baking sheet lined with parchment paper or silpat mat.
- Using kitchen sheers, cut two ears. You can see how I cut the ears from the sour cream bunny buns post. Beat one egg yolk. Brush the top of each pretzel bunny with the beaten egg yolk. Bake until dark golden brown in color, approximately 8 minutes. Add eyes with edible marker after pretzels have cooled.
Notes
The nutrition information provided are only estimates based on an online nutritional calculator. I am not a certified nutritionist. Please consult a professional nutritionist or doctor for accurate information and any dietary restrictions and concerns you may have.
Thank you! Here’s how mine came out:
https://sialiasnest.tumblr.com/post/181094836217/pretzel-hamster
thanks for sharing!
How many bunnies does this make?
I’m sorry, this is an older recipe so I can’t recall anymore. Definitely more than a dozen though!
They are so cute! I will try to bake them and then just look at them! They are just too cute to be eaten 🙂
Haha, maybe you could give them away if you aren’t able to eat them?
So cute!
So cute!! I love what you’ve done.
I’m happy with all the positive responses!
These are adorable. I will definitely be making these when I get home from work 🙂 I may or may not add the eyes, though… I have a hard time eating things with faces. I get this huge feeling of guilt and distress, haha.
I’m the same way. sometimes I make ones without faces especially for me to eat. For these, I ate from the back. hehe
These are so adorable!
Thanks!
Oh so cute:-D
Adorable! I think I’d want to eat away from the eyes, too…
It’s too hard to eat the face first!
Cute! They sorta remind me of mini Pikachu, haha!
Yes! I agree. It’s the pointy ears and the ends being a darker shade. hehe.
These are adorable! I also wanted to let you know that I awarded you the Versatile Blogger Award, which you can check out here: https://evabakes.blogspot.com/2012/04/hersheys-chocolate-mint-dessert-aka.html
Aw, thanks!