This recipe for gluten free soft pretzel bites stuffed with peanut butter and Nutella is a decadent snack.
You know how sometimes you slave over a hot stove and oven for hours, and your family just kind of, well, shrugs when you place your masterpiece in front of them? Well sometimes I'm just simply not willing to risk such a lukewarm reception so I need a homerun.
That's when I break out recipes like Garlic Pizza Bread Sticks—and/or these stuffed gluten free soft pretzel bites. They're sweet and salty, chewy and just a little bit crisp. In other words, they're perfect.
I filled some with Nutella, others with peanut butter, and still others with a mix of the two. I'll be honest: I preferred the bites stuffed with just peanut butter. But wait! I have good reason.
Nutella hazelnut spread (yes! it's gluten free) is unlike any other nut butter, as it's quite a bit thinner. As such, it really does tend to run. And since I tried filling these bites every which way and found that the best way is by filling a whole cylinder at once, and then slicing the cylinder into bites, there will be some filling that peeks out the side of each bite.
When that filling is Nutella, it is more likely to escape from the sides of each bite during baking. The other potential way to fill the bites is to pipe tiny little mounds of filling onto a baking sheet like this, freeze them, and then wrap a small piece of dough around each mound.
But then you end up with round pieces of dough, and personally I just don't like the look. Pretzel bites should have squared edges. They rise better, and bake up more beautiful—just like you expect pretzel bites to look.
Serve them with hot fudge sauce, or just melt some chocolate for dipping.