My "simple" weekend was relatively more simple than the previous weekend, but far from the simple plan I had vowed to make. Simplifying is a process, I guess, rather than a cold-turkey absolute.

This weekends menu consisted of:

The Sourdoughs were happening in parallel, and only had slight variations in recipe, most notably the Slow Rise had 1/4 cup of my starter, whereas the Quick Rise had 6 times the amount, with 1 1/2 cups starter. In the end, the Quick one had a better final baking rise, and a more traditional white sourdough color, but a milder sourdough flavour. The Slow one had a rather flat baking rise, a yellowish color to the crust, and a stronger sourdough flavour. Personally I liked both, but the Quick one fit the part better.

This coming weekend I am going to repeat the Quick one with Whole Meal flour. I also found from chatting with Hayden, a runner at work who has a background as a chef, that the long rise times done out of the fridge could likely kill the yeast. In his restaurant days, they would do an initial proofing/ferment out of the fridge, then at the end of the evening, punch the dough down, shape it a bit, and pop it in the fridge over night to proof and continue a slow ferment. In the AM, they would plop it on a sheet, and the toss it in the oven. Soon I want to try this technique and see what it yields.**

The Garlic Naan was a fairly standard affair when it came to the dough, with the minor addition of pureed garlic in the dough itself. But the cooking process was the fun part. The recipe's suggestion had been to cook on one side with a cast iron skillet, one of which I had conveniently just acquired for FREE from some appliance purchases. Then the other side was to be placed on the open stove flame, in order to emulate the charring created by the tandoor traditionally used to bake naan. In my attempts, the first 1 or 2 naan came out a bit over crisped, but by the 3rd one, I had gotten a bit of the hang of things, and the skillet had warmed up enough, that things started looking and feeling right. By the later half of the batch of 10, I was pulling nice charred yet fluffy flat breads off the flame one after another. I even got some good bubbling going in the breads. In the end, they were a decent hit at the Indian themed dinner get together, so I was quite happy with the experiment as a whole.

Being winter NZ, it had been high time to get rid of my hot chili plants in the garden (long over-due really). So I stripped all the plants of their chilies (75 in total), found an authentic looking recipe for garlic chili hot sauce, and proceeded to make a triple batch of the stuff. I may have overdone the sesame oil a bit in the recipe, but the result went over well with the Indian food, and there is a giant jar still left that Ms. DMS and I are getting to enjoy with our meals.

Finally it was Cinnamon Twisty Bread time again, this time without the maple syrup addition. I had a bit of fun with the shapes, and the recipe itself is getting a bit more second nature,l as this is the 4th or 5th time making it. The only aspect I still haven't nailed down is a good way to liquify the Butter/Brown sugar/Cinnamon mixture into an easily spreadable substance. In the end though it all just melts together in the bake, but regardless I'm working on it. the next evolution of this bread will likely be to try and make it "purist" style, in other words, swapping the commercial instant yeast for my sourdough starter "The Beast". Should be fun!

** I recently stumbled accross a book that reiterates many of Hayden's points, so I will likely be pulling a lot of ideas from it. The book is called "Peter Reinhart's Artisan Breads Every Day", and on initial skimming seems to have some rwally solid bread making techniques and recipes.