Better than Pizza
With entrepreneurship spurred by the pandemic, many home bakers are coming out of the woodwork and offering a host of different baked goods for sale these days, amongst them breads especially sourdough.
One of the queens of the sourdough genre is Ann Tan, who has been quietly, unbeknownst to me, gathering a fan club for her sourdough breads. Until I tasted Ann’s naturally leavened sourdough, I hadn’t had any gustatory “aha” moments from the different sources I would buy from.
But when I got wind of the fact that she made a chilli focaccia, my Foodie curiosity was immediately piqued. It had my 3 Loves: chilli, sourdough and Focaccia (pronounced Foh-cahtch-ah), an Italian flat bread originating in Northern Italy.
So I immediately ordered one and as is so typical of impulsive OTT me, I asked for extra pedas (extra hot). Poor Ann, she followed my instructions to the letter and the resultant bread which tasted so yummy on arrival as it was warm and straight out of the oven, was absolutely burning and impossible to eat the next day once cold from the fridge and toasted.
As she explained to me, the chillies had time to soak through the whole bread and on toasting, exacerbated the heat!! So she very kindly offered to bake me another and having just received it today, a Duck and Mixed Herbs Focaccia, I had a slice and it was perfect!! I requested for an extra bit of salt and I noticed there was more olive oil in this one and no extra oil was needed. The chilli factor was also perfect. Yummilicious doesn’t even describe it. The “Aha” moment was there and it lingered on my taste buds for at least an hour!
As of this moment, this feels like my “forever bread”. Thank you, Ann Tan.
For those of my dear readers who missed the first article, here is the link where you can see the variety of other breads that Ann offers.
RM25 for one 12x9x2 inches. And that’s a big one!
She does require a minimum two days notice.
She also conducts workshops on naturally leavened bread.
Ann Tan
Call or WhatsApp: 012 522 2291