I had this exact problem as well when wanting to start a tech blog. I wanted to write on my own space, not a platform like Medium.

This led me to create my own tool [0] to make minimalist blogs with Markdown, no messy code or configuration needed. The end result is my site [1], which although barebones, I think looks decently good for now.

[https://pageful.is] [https://viktor.pageful.is]