The scraps of bread were given to children as rewards for good behavior.

German immigrants brought the tradition to America when they settled in Pennsylvania in the 1700s. Pretzel making became an important part of the state’s heritage.

“When people think of Pennsylvania, they think of pretzels,” says native son Michael A. Rothman.

Pretzel makers were common in the Amish country of Lancaster County when Rothmanwas growing up in nearby Harrisburg.

But it wasn’t until years later, after he had graduated from a college in Arizona, married and become a successful computer consultant that those childhood memories resurfaced, changing the course of his life.

It started with a photograph.

Rothman was visiting his parents in Harrisburg when he saw it in the local newspaper. A Lebanon, Pa., pretzel maker is captured in the photo dumping a paddle of soft pretzels into baskets while customers stand, lined up around the building to buy them.

“When I saw that shot,” Rothman says, “I said, ‘That’s what I want to do.’ A picture is worth a thousand words.”

It was the memories of the rural countryside of his home state that led Rothman to buy some land and an old farmhouse on Cherry Hill Road in Davie County after accepting a computer consulting job with U.S. Airways.

Before that, Rothman had worked at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore, where he met and married his wife, Donna.

Rothman and his mother had collaborated in a business venture in the mid ’80s, in which she created seasonings for hard pretzels in her home and Rothman helped bake, package and market them on evenings and weekends. He was doing that on a part-time basis when he and Donna moved to Davie.

Rothman gave up the hard pretzels in early 1997, however, when the photograph prompted him to pursue the soft pretzels.

He approached a longtime Pennsylvania pretzel maker about buying his recipe. After agreeing on a price and a contract whereby Rothman would pay the man royalties for every pretzel sold, he was in business.

But first, he had to renovate the vacant building on his property for use as a pretzel shop and buy the equipment to furnish it.

The work is chronicled in a series of photographs displayed in two poster-size frames just inside the shop. They are followed by a photograph of a RV which was parked in his driveway for a week while the pretzel maker from whom he had bought the recipe taught him the fine art of pretzel making.

And it is an art, Rothman says.“I think probably the biggest challenge of this business is to be able to master making the dough,” he says.

There are so many factors a pretzel maker has to consider, according to Rothman, such as temperature. If it’s too hot, for example, the dough will rise too quickly.

Rothman uses high-protein flour to make the sour dough for the pretzels. “It’s kind of stinky, but it gives it a good flavor,” he says while preparing a batch.

The 48 pounds of dough in the 80-quart, heavy-duty mixer will yield 216 pretzels. “This is a standard batch for us,” he says.

After the dough has been kneaded to Rothman’s satisfaction, he picks it up and places it on a cutting board, where he cuts and weighs, dividing it into six, 8-pound loaves.

“Pretzel dough is stiff,” he says, tearing off a piece. “It’s like rubber.”

A loaf fits into a dough divider, which Rothman operates manually to form 36, 3.5-ounce dough balls.

“I don’t have fancy smancy machinery,” he says. “Everything’s done by brute force. When you start out, you have to nickel and dime it.”

Rothman pauses to give the dough time to relax. “When it comes out of the mixer, it’s real tight,” he says.

Next, the balls run through a dough sheeter machine, turning them into rolled strips of dough which are either twisted or left alone depending on what kind of pretzel Rothman is making.

The next step is the most difficult for some people, but Rothman picked it up on the fifth try.

It’s making the twist.

Using both hands, Rothman rolls the dough until it’s thin on both ends, then flips it over and crosses the ends in a twist, pushing them into the dough to secure the shape.

“What was unusual was that I picked it up so quickly,” he says. “That was the spooky thing about it. It becomes sort of a reflex after a while.”

Though the traditional Pennsylvania soft pretzel is evenly shaped, Rothman has developed his own unique style.

“It just kind of evolved,” he says. “You get hard little stick pretzels and a big fat pretzel you can sink your teeth in.People are starting to know this as our pretzel.”

Rothman says people often ask him how many pretzels he has rolled in the two and a half years he has been doing this. “I’ve probably rolled out at least a half a million to a million, easy,” he says.

The dough for pretzel sticks, which also can be used as hot dog buns, is baked like it comes out of the sheeter.

The twist and stick pretzels are dipped in a mixture that gives them the brown coating and adds flavor. After pulling them out on a drain board, he places them on specially designed baking sheets and sprinkles pretzel salt on top.

From there, they go in the oven for 15 minutes, and after a few minutes to cool down, they’re ready to eat.

Rothman can bake up to 120 pretzels at one time.

The first batch is recorded in the collage of photographs. They tell the story of the Carolina Dutch Pretzel Company.

That’s the name Donna Rothman suggested when they started the business. “The Dutch is for Pennsylvania,” he says. “The Carolina is for here.”

As far as he knows, Rothman is the first person to make Pennsylvania pretzels in North Carolina.

“It’s a unique thing,” he says. “I just have to create a good market for it.”

And he seems to be doing just that. “The demand for pretzels is really, really hot,” he says.

Rothman delivers pretzels to schools in Davie and Forsyth counties on a weekly basis. Davie County High School sells at least 10 dozen pretzel sticks a week.

“Kids love them,” Rothman says. “They get addicted to them.”

Rothman also delivers to hospitals and banks in Winston-Salem and Ketchie Creek Bakery in Mocksville on a regular basis. In Salisbury, his pretzels can be purchased at Rowan Regional Medical Center, the Hefner Veterans Affairs Medical Center and, on Wednesdays, at Spanky’s Homemade Ice Cream and Deli.

He also sells pretzels at the Lawrence Joel Vietnam Memorial Coliseum in Winston-Salem and at area weekend festivals. Rothman’s pretzels can also be purchased at area sporting events.

“We like to consider ourselves the official soft pretzel of the Demon Deacons,” he says.

Rothman sells 400 to 2,000 pretzels a day at weekend events for 75 cents to $1 apiece. Customers may choose from French, Dijon or Rothman’s own sweet variety of mustards.

What amazes him, he says, is when people put mustard or ketchup on a cinnamon-and-sugar-flavored pretzel.

Getting pretzels ready for delivery calls for early mornings, 3 a.m. in some cases, and late hours for Rothman.

“When you’re doing your own thing, you have to be flexible,” he says. “This business is not 9 to 5.”

Though his wife helps with deliveries and bookkeeping, Rothman says pretzel making is basically a one-man job. If he’s out sick, “nobody does it for me,” he says. “You have to be relentless. I have some 20-hour days.”

Marketing is a major part of the business. Making contacts and following up with them is essential to success.

“I feel the business has really challenged me in all ways,” Rothman says. “Physically, it’s challenging. Emotionally, it’s challenging.”

But the most important challenge, he says, is to have a good product. “I think we have a good flavor as far as soft pretzels go.” Photographs of satisfied customers, many of them children, are included in the collage. “That’s the future generation of pretzel eaters,” he says of one group of children.

Rothman recently received an order for pretzels shaped in letters to spell out a little girl’s name. Her parents put birthday candles on them at a party in lieu of a cake.

Some native Germans who have bought Rothman’s pretzels have told him they’re better than what they can buy in their homeland. “I consider that very flattering,” he says.

Though he works hard, Rothman is enjoying his role as a pretzel maker.

“It’s a new twist on life,” he says. “You get immediate feedback on how you’re doing when people try your product whereas in my old field, it would take forever.”

The Carolina Dutch Pretzel Company is only open to the public on Saturdays from 9 a.m. to noon. Soft pretzel twists and sticks and cinnamon rolls are available on an ongoing basis.

In addition, Rothman is selling tins and decorative bags of chocolate-covered pretzels for the holidays.

Pretzel twists and sticks and pretzel clusters, which sell for $2 a pack, are coated with chocolate and decorated in festive holiday colors. All of these make great stocking stuffers.

Holiday tins, which include an assortment of chocolate covered pretzels and pretzel clusters, sell for $8.75.

Holiday gift bags, which include one pack each of chocolate-covered twists, sticks and pretzel clusters, sell for $6.75.

Rothman will customize tins, gift bags or individual packs upon request and will ship to friends, relatives and business associates in other parts of the country.

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The Carolina Dutch Pretzel Company is located at 136 Cherry Hill Road. To get there from Salisbury, take Highway 601 North to Cherry Hill Road , which turns to the right 1.3 miles past the Davie County line, and go almost to the end.

The pretzel company is on the left side within sight of the stop sign for Highway 801. Look for the pretzel sign beside the road and on the building.