This dairy-and-egg free take on a traditional Scandinavian recipe is considerably lighter than the original, which called for eggs, butter, buttermilk and sour cream. Lars (who may very well be buttering me up) gives them his thumbs up.
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup Earth Balance OR other non-hydrogenated margarine
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup soy creamer OR plain soy/rice milk
1/2 Tbsp white vinegar
1/2 cup + 2 Tbsp plain soy yogurt
3 cups unbleached all purpose flour
3 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
Add the vinegar to the soy milk and let sit for a few minutes. Cream the sugar and the margarine in a large bowl. Add the vanilla extract, soured soy milk and soy yogurt. In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt.
Add the dry ingredients to the wet, one cup at a time, until everything is well combined. You should have a sticky dough. Cover and refrigerate for several hours or overnight.
Once the dough is thoroughly chilled, preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Flour a surface well. With clean hands, grab a handful of dough and roll it out to form a rope. Split the rope into three pieces and roll each piece until it forms a rope 1/2-inch thick and about 18 inches long.
Twist the two ends over each other, then bring the loop up on top of the twined ends to form a pretzel-like shape. (The cookies will puff up as they bake, so leave some space inside the loops.)
Transfer the pretzel shapes to an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake for 8-10 minutes, or until the undersides are golden brown. Keep the remaining dough and any unbaked shaped cookies cold in the fridge so they don't spread.
The traditional way to eat these is spread with margarine (or butter) along with a strong cup of coffee. They'll keep for a few days at room temperature or in the fridge, or you may freeze them for up to 3 months.
