Federal Pretzel Baking Company of South Philadelphia was the first large scale manufacturing soft pretzel factory in Philadelphia and the United States of America. The impact of the recipe, production, and distribution established it as a new standard cuisine of Philadelphia

Cuisine of Philadelphia

The cuisine of Philadelphia was shaped largely by the city's mixture of ethnicities, available foodstuffs and history. Certain foods have become iconic to the city. Invented in Philadelphia in the 1930s, the cheesesteak is the most well known icon of the city, and soft pretzels have become a part...

 during the 1900s.

History

1922 : Maria and Giuseppe Nacchio owned a small Italian American

Italian American

An Italian American , is an American of Italian ancestry. The designation may also refer to someone possessing Italian and American dual citizenship...

 vitalian artisan

Artisan

An artisan is a skilled manual worker who makes items that may be functional or strictly decorative, including furniture, clothing, jewellery, household items, and tools...

 bread

Bread

Bread is a staple food prepared by cooking a dough of flour and water and often additional ingredients. Doughs are usually baked, but in some cuisines breads are steamed , fried , or baked on an unoiled frying pan . It may be leavened or unleavened...

 bakery where Maria Nacchio’s would make bakery styled soft pretzels. During the 1920s her son Edmund took the recipe and started to bake them in large quantities combining workers who would hand twist the pretzels and appling conveyor systems of equipment imported from Germany that could be used for mass production and baking and thereby established Federal Pretzel Baking Company. The company was forwarded by the four brothers Joseph, Carmine, Anthony and Edmund.

1940 : The Federal government Department of Agriculture consulted the American Institute of Baking

American Institute of Baking

The American Institute of Baking is a not-for-profit corporation, founded by the North American wholesale and retail baking industries in 1919 as a technology transfer center for bakers and food processors...

 and with advanced bakers of America like the Nacchio family to address the shortage of wheat

Wheat

Wheat is a cereal grain, originally from the Levant region of the Near East, but now cultivated worldwide. In 2007 world production of wheat was 607 million tons, making it the third most-produced cereal after maize and rice...

 flour during the World War they innovated alternative ingredients and baking techniques using corn

Corn

Corn is the name used in the United States, Canada, and Australia for the grain maize.In much of the English-speaking world, the term "corn" is a generic term for cereal crops, such as* Barley* Oats* Wheat* Rye- Places :...

 flour as a percentage subsititute composing a mix of flour(s) for breads and other baked goods like pretzels.

1963 : The record for the largest pretzel ever baked was baked by Joseph Nacchio of Federal Baking, Philadelphia, PA. : It was 40 lbs,pounds 5-feet across. This record was repeated with the largest pretzel appearing in a Hollywood movie at 20 lb., 4’ pretzel shown in the 1963 film

Film

A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...

 production of “It’s a Mad, Mad, and Mad World.”.

1978 : First machine produced soft pretzel. Federal Baking Company used the original 1922 recipe but the last hand-twisted pretzel was made in 1978.

1993 : The Pretzel Museum

Museum

A museum is an institution that cares for a collection of artifacts and other objects of scientific, artistic, cultural, or historical importance and makes them available for public viewing through exhibits that may be permanent or temporary. Most large museums are located in major cities...

 opened in Philadelphia by members of the Nacchio family to highlight the area’s preference for Federal Baking's more unique shaped pretzels being baked soft and unlike the dominant more circular hard pretzels produced in western Pennsylvania. Champion hand pretzel twister Helen Hoff demonstrated producing 57 pretzels per minute at this first museum. The Museum was closed prior to 1999.

2000 : The family owned and operated company was continued by the various family members for four generations until it was sold to a comgolmerate business, J & J Snack Foods Corporation

J & J Snack Foods Corporation

The J & J Snack Foods Corporation is a food and beverage manufacturing and marketing conglomerate based in Pennsauken, New Jersey. Primarily involved with frozen beverages and "nutritious" snack foods, the group owns such well-known brands as ICEE, SuperPretzel, Bavarian Pretzel Bakery, Mrs...

in the year 2000.

Philadelphia Soft Pretzel

A Soft Pretzel is doubled looped bread dough, baked with a soft inside and then topped with coarse salt. The pretzels are often slathered with yellow or brown mustard. Federal Baking estimated it at a quart for each 200 pretzels sold. During the 1900s street vendors for 80 years sold them on street corners in wooden glass enclosed cases or employed young boys to make extra cash who walked through the streets carrying baskets loaded with soft hot pretzels yelling aloud the phrase "Fresh Pret-zels". The soft pretzel became a staple Philadelphia food for snacking at school, at work or home, party trays and considered by most to be a quick meal.

External links

• Official web site