…Because it makes me feel, for however brief a moment, that the only problem that matters in this whole wide world is the flipped over toy train, or the ball that fell behind the shelf or any other such little things that can easily be fixed. And it’s very comforting.

I believe in making the world a better place humbly. By being a good person, doing good things and creating to bring amusement and joy be it through music or crafting or taking pictures of things that make me happy. All the choices we have been making — moving to Portland, starting our own business which we can be proud of taking part in (as opposed to pretending that something amiss isn’t going on somewhere in it), supporting other small businesses, consuming mostly whole-foods, choosing to re-use, recycle or re-purpose whenever possible, always learning better ways of doing things — hasn’t been the easiest of paths. Regardless, we have chosen this path because we believe that it contributes to making the world a better place, if only marginally.

But there are so much crappy things going on around us, not just in far away places I’ve never been to, but right here. All these protests going on everyday, everywhere,  for every kinds of reasons, remind me continuously that the situation of our world as we know it is…dire.  And it gets to me. I can’t help feeling upset that I don’t have a better world to offer our kids.

Simply put, it’s just a bread dough cooked on a griddle/skillet. So if you already have a recipe for a dough you enjoy working with, I imagine you can cook that up on a griddle. But if you have never made any kind of yeast bread, this is a very easy place to start since it doesn’t even require an oven! This ‘naan’ idea was born when I happen to wonder if I can cook up a yeasty bread dough on a skillet (like the way tortilla is made) and I tried it — and it worked. So here it is, you can try it too.

The Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cup warm water
• 2 teaspoon yeast (…is about 1 pack yeast)
• 2 teaspoon salt
• 3 cups flour

[NOTE: This silly proportion isn't accidental, I tried following recipes with various proportion of these ingredients — and it really makes not much difference, probably because how a dough comes out largely depends on anything but the exact measurements (climate, humidity, how you measured your ingredients etc. etc.) ...so the starting point might as well be easy to remember!]

1. In a large bowl, pour in 1 1/2 cup warm water. The temperature of this water can’t be too hot or your yeast will die — and that will be very sad. When I say warm, it’s about as warm as if you stuck your hand in it, it would feel about as warm as when you hold someone’s hand (or rub your furry friend’s belly…) and find it warm to your touch). If you aren’t sure, use cooler rather than hotter water (if the water is cooler, it just takes longer for the dough to rise, but it will eventually work).
2. Add salt to the warm water. (I will note here that — from what I understand — salt slows down the process of yeast, so if you happen to have sluggish tired yeast, you might consider using 1/2 a teaspoon less. I found that this amount works best for the yeast I happen to have in producing dough that behaves more predictably when cooked, in about 2 hours
3. Scatter yeast slowly, gently and evenly over the surface of salted warm water. Adding yeast this way is the easiest way, to avoid getting clumps. (Taking time here saves you time and frustration in the whole process!) And then stir to dissolve.
4. Dump in 3 cups of flour to the salt, yeast water mixture. And mix with a spoon or spatula. Mix just until the flour is incorporated. (most people add liquid to the flour, but less dishes to wash this way and the dough mixes up just fine!). [NOTE: If you measure your flour correctly, you might find that you need up to extra 1/4 cup or so of flour (which would be total of 3 1/4 cup flour). But if you are like myself, and measure flour the 'wrong' way (scoop the flour using measuring scoop right out the bag — thus compacting it a little) you'll probably find that you only need about 3 cups.]
5. Cover, and leave it alone until the mixture doubles, the dough is flattened on top (as in, no longer dome shaped) and bubbly. This takes about 2 hours, a little less if your room is warm, and a little longer if your room is cold.
6. Dip a large spoon (like a serving spoon or rice serving paddle works great for me) in water (to keep the dough from sticking to it) and gather up the gooey dough into a ball. And now you have a basic dough you can make into anything! …To make a ‘naan’:
7. Dump the dough onto a floured surface and divide the dough into smaller pieces (size depends on how big you want each naan). Something about the size of lemon makes a medium-ish naan. [NOTE: I use spreader knife (or anything else with blunt edge. Dough scraper would be ideal if you have it handy — mine is somewhere lost in the mystery drawer) coated in some flour to cut the dough by pushing the blade down into the dough. Quite frankly, using sharp knife in sawing motion doesn't work well at all for this,  tearing it by hand stretches the dough frustratingly, and using serrated knife ...well  just hate washing gooey dough off of it — but whatever works for you!]
8. Using more flour as needed to keep the dough from being sticky, take the little dough into your hands  and shape a ball by stretching and smoothing the top surface of the dough and gathering the excess to the bottom. I realize that this is much more easily done than explained, but it is as if stretching the dough to cover an invisible spherical object and pinching shut the seam on the bottom to enclose this invisible spherical item (the mind bender in this analogical explanation is that this invisible spherical item has zero mass!). Essentially, you are trying to form a ball that has smooth surface (at the top anyhow. You needn’t worry too much about the seam on the bottom). This process helps you create a ball of dough that is more responsive to your shaping — which otherwise behaves like it has a mind of it’s own when you try to shape and bake it.
9. Preheat your griddle or skillet on your stove, about medium high.
10. Take the little ball of dough and flatten a bit on the floured surface. Then pick it up and stretch it with your two hands until desired thinness (1/4 inch or so). Keep the surface of the dough floured to keep it from sticking to your hand.  If the ball of dough is difficult to stretch (breaks easily and makes holed, for example) then leave it alone for few minutes and come back to find more obedient dough!
11. Place this naan shaped dough immediately on the hot griddle/skillet. If you are using cast iron ones, you won’t need to oil the surface. Cook the first side until the bottom has golden brown spots, and then flip to cook the other side. It’s done when it has golden spots on both sides.

Ta-da! Enjoy your ‘naan’! I like it with butter, kids eat it with jam, my husband fold it in half to put stuff in it for a sandwich.

I have found that baking bread is a lot less about the proportion of ingredients or the order in which they get mixed, but really how the dough gets handled. My first attempt months ago was absolutely good enough on the first try (these no knead breads are quite difficult to mess up!) but as I baked often — almost daily! — texture and flavor of the bread definitely improved! …So enjoy baking often, you might be amused by what these FOUR ingredients can do for you.

———

This recipe and instruction is written by me for your enjoyment, but the amazing easy no knead dough idea itself isn’t — needless to say — mine. I was inspired by and adapted methods I learned making No Knead Dutch Oven Breads  and also easy baking methods illustrated in “Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day: The Discovery That Revolutionizes Home Baking”  … just so the credit is given where it’s due:)

When they are all bunched up like this, none of them look very special, but there’s actually lots of cute ones. Not that mediocre ones aren’t useful.

…Here’s some red, yellow and black ones.

My favorite ones are glass buttons, but in the end, I use plastic ones the most in crafting. I think I shall be able to find perfect buttons for most projects!

After some poking around the web, I compared some instructions and then came up with a design that I thought were best for our purpose. I found this to be great for the basic idea, and this instruction that uses PVC pipes helpful for the poles, and then got some design ideas from this one. Essentially, it’s a teepee, but I don’t want to be responsible for cultural incorrectness so I’m calling it a “teepee inspired boho princess play tent”.

I had Todd go to home improvement store for PVC pipes which they kindly cut it down to specs for me. The 6 poles and 12 end caps cost us total of $15.64. Basically, this was the only items I didn’t already have in the stash so this is the total project cost Todd drilled holes in them (like it’s done in this instruction) because I figured this would probably keep the poles together nicely. From there, I happen to have a huge sheet of knit jersey fabric that a retired seamstress gave me years ago and I was glad I finally found use for it!

Here’s Lucian, he woke up from a nap and NOT helping me. (This is why I don’t generally even bother trying to make large items!)

And here it is all done! It’s exactly roomy enough to fit 3 kids in.

Here’s the details of the top portion. I reinforced the top edge  that comes around the poles with corduroy in the same color (I happen to have some, also from the same retired seamstress!) because the main fabric is stretchy (which was a factor I was willing to work around because using this fabric — which doesn’t fray — means I won’t have to hem the seams!). I made loops to lace the cord which is attached to the center of gigantic semi-circle to hold the fabric in place over the poles. I added strips of sari fabric and glittered bell and key for decoration.

While at it, I also made the birthday cake.

Lucian got to run around and play with his big brother and sister on the grass for the first time.

Little Lucian. I still call him this, but at this point it’s almost an ironic nickname since he is as heavy as Immi! Look at him go, he totally isn’t a baby anymore

I’m glad he really liked it! (He fell a sleep with it in his band). It just occurred to me, he would totally adore bunny version of marshmallow peeps won’t he? I’ll have to get some!

It’s almost amusing how much it sucks to catch a cold (almost!) despite being such a simple ailment. Sigh. Among us, Ashland is the worst off, poor guy was whimpering and shedding tears of misery. Lucian on the other hand is — as snotty, coughy and feverish as he is — as rambunctious as he always is.

Anyhow. The other day I saw an almost really cute recipe organizing binder. Actually, I think it was at Costco. It had almost cute binder, with almost cute dividers, and almost cute papers in it. But it definitely wasn’t cute enough for me actually want it. I did get an idea though, that I should try the “binder” system. It worked in grade schools for organizing bunch of different subjects, why not recipes? So I dusted off a half-size binder that wasn’t being used (I figured it would work better on the book stand than full size one), and with some craft papers and stickers in my stash — I made this!

I imagine I could probably have bought dividers at office supply shop, but I always try to make things if I have supplies for it — they turned out happy looking!

My categories are a bit different from how most people would organize their recipes, probably. I actually have very little recipes for meals (main dish, salads, soups…) because I don’t generally cook from recipes (If I want to learn to make something, I compare multiple recipes, and then make up my own to suit my pantry and and my taste). But I’m starting to have lots of pieces of paper/digital-documents for breads and cookies (along with haphazard notes from experiments!) because with these things, it’s necessary to get proportions of ingredients right or it doesn’t work at all. “Herbs” section will have my incense recipes which I have been working on and aroma therapy blends (which are currently on  pieces of paper stuck inside various books on the topic…digital ones are forever lost I think). I made “drinks” category because I’m hoping to collect and develope recipes for probiotic drinks (kefir and kombutcha!) in coming weeks. “Craft” section has recipes for homemade playdoughs and glue — I hope I will find more things to put in it.

I made book-cover-like flap for bookmarking the page. Because I know I will need it.

Hopefully it will inspire me to add more to it, and cook/blend/concoct more things!