And Now For A Very "Special" Tucson Homeskillet

I woke up one morning particularly hazy. 

The night before I imbibed in a new found obsession, mesquite smoked whiskey. Dear lord it is so good. Imagine drinking bacon wrapped in a campfire, one that hits all senses making for a heady discourse of whimsy once the coal rapture gullet burn subsides a bit. 

On top of that, I was also drinking my usual, a vodka soda, a cocktail the wife and I began to embrace when we realized that we enjoyed booze but hated the weight it keeps on our aging bodies. "What do skinny people drink?" Clear alcohol and sugar free mixers. Done. 

I was about two cocktails in when I ordered a sipper glass of the whiskey. To say the least I was feeling very good. Luckily I had the next day off so sleeping in was an option. It always was. Even with my day job, showing up bleary does not prevent me from getting work done. It's a a pretty easy job. It's county work. Being slightly hungover actually makes for a more enjoyable work day. That sounded a bit sad didn't it?

Anyway, as we were getting ready to leave some friends showed up at the bar. We decided to stay a little bit longer. Actually we stayed longer than usual. Us old married folk are normally in our jammers by 9pm, deep into some movie or show we are currently obsessed with and either cooking or eating dinner. One more drink, one more shot. I was at that stage where I was nervous to drive home. Fortunately it is a quick straight shot from our hangout and on very familiar territory so I knew how to juggle the current stage of wobble. 

When we finally got home we had a few more drinks. A show we really love (okay, it's goddam 'Game of Thrones', jeesh) was premiering that night and we were in full celebratory mode. The wife didn't have to get up till 10am so if we were asleep by 2am that's a full 8 hours. Thing is she likes to sleep a minimum of 10 hours so when midnight rolled around and we were well over our limit she went straight to bed. 

Me? I was amped up. After taking a shower, with a drink to boot, I got out, fit in some earbuds and started listening to some music. This went on for another hour or so. Another drink. I was okay, pretty drunk, but cognizant. Time to put on a familiar movie. I opted for "Meatballs", this late '70s summer camp comedy starring a very young Bill Murray. Another drink. I was halfway through the movie and still going. Another drink. I was wasted. I finally finished the movie around 3am, slammed a big glass of water and passed out. 

The alarm went off at 10am, apparently, but I was so fuzzy and still drunk that I thought it was all part of some strained dream my liquored brain was attempting. The wife kissed me goodbye, which shook me awake, said I smelled like booze and wished me a fine day of sleeping it off. Then darkness. I awoke again way past noon and remembered that I had an appointment for an upcoming article I had scheduled for the publication I write for. I was so knackered and nauseous that I emailed my contact with some bullshit excuse saying my camera was on the fritz and we'd have to reschedule. The response was part annoyance, part understanding and I told them I'd visit in a few days. 

Eventually I got up, drank some water - a lot of water - choked down some leftover Indian food and decided to go out to the garden and check in on some herbs that were starting to sprout. The late spring sun was out in full force and the current condition my 46 year old body was going through made it feel as if I was in a surreal sweat lodge and I realized that I wasn't feeling too great. Not at all. 

Deciding to power through it, telling myself over and over that "Well, you did this to yourself", I carried on with my amateur gardening duties. As I leaned down to remove some leaves from a bed of up and coming arugula I began to throw up. The Indian food was one factor in taste and texture of the bile but I also got hints of smoked whiskey as well. The yellowish brown belly spew splashed down on a dirt space between the arugula and a succulent plant my wife plucked from a recent visit to San Diego. It just kept coming out. Towards the end I began to retch, enough where I hoped that a neighbor could not hear me. Or perhaps the opposite: If they heard my strained anguish of booze purge perhaps they would come over and help me and by help I mean hit me with a shovel and take me out for good. Once it was all out I started to feel 'better' but I also felt worse than I have in a long time. 

I lay there on the couch, head spinning and body shaking. I then realized that this isn't even that uncommon of a day for me. I did not want to label myself as an alcoholic. But that is what I have somehow spun into. Which began to scare me. 

It was right then and there that I knew something had to be done. 

The chug king in full action

Growing up in the 70s and 80s when a popular TV show, especially comedies, advertised that next week's episode is going to be a 'very special' one, it usually meant that the subject was going to be heavy - like one of the main characters smokes weed or is touched inappropriately by a bicycle shop owner or the kid next door is abused...stuff like that. The Homeskillet is notoriously not heavy, except for the Metal, which is why I decided to call this post 'special'.

Because its a little heavy.

Me admitting to an alcohol dependency, or at least regular habit, is not easy for me. But it has to be said. I need to type this out and get it out there, even if it only hits a few readers...I don't care. This is for me and helping me halt my drinking to at least a manageable level. I don't want to quit, not right now, because my food writing job keeps me tasting beer, wine and spirits on a fairly regular basis. Heck, I just got tagged to judge an upcoming margarita competition. But I do want it to get down to a very dull roar.

If you know me and the history of this blog, I restarted and refurbished the Homeskillet after a very sad and very trying year to help me cope. In 2014 my step dad (my dad's husband) died from complications of Alzheimer's, then a month later my real dad died, literally from a broken heart, soon after She-Ra's grandmother passed a month or so before we had to put our dog down which was almost immediately followed by our cat getting eaten by coyotes.

Yeah.

2014 sucked.

* * *

The first time I got drunk I was almost 22. I started pretty late, comparatively, because of my self professed 'straight edge' lifestyle I embraced in my teens. Doing drugs, getting wasted and smoking cigarettes just seemed dumb to me. A lot of straight edge kids even abstain from sex but...screw that. All I ever wanted to do was hook up with girls and when I lost my virginity at 16 my straight edge-ness only referred to chemical use.

It was a girl, funny enough, that drove me to try booze for the first time and a close friend that had been dabbling in weekly drunk fests with other small town derelicts. When she broke up with me, seemingly out of the blue, I was seriously bummed. My friend suggested getting a bunch of beer and cheap champagne to try to cheer me up and get her off my mind. It sort of worked. As the night progressed other people joined in and before long it turned into a party. A few hours into it most of the visitors either passed out or just left. Not me. I was wide awake. I stayed up all night finishing the beer and champagne listening to hardcore records and punk EPs. I felt great and was having way too much fun. The sun came up and I drove home but not before grabbing some breakfast. I was wasted but I was young and could handle it.

A little more than 20 years later and my body can not handle that kind of abuse.


In 2014 my casual drinking increased ten fold. I couldn't deal with the sadness; it seemed that every other month a family member was dying. I was barely at work that year and when I was I was distant, not including being totally hungover. My booze fog could always be blamed on the fact that someone else had just passed but in 2015 I had had enough and needed a new outlet.

I contacted a popular food website asking if they needed a writer. They said sure. I turned in 3 articles before realizing our styles just didn't match up and we parted amicably. That same week I turned the old funky Homeskillet blog into the website you see today...which is still a blog but, man, the old style was pretty hokey and amateurish. My goal was to post a full article each week; minimum of 1,000 words and at least 10 pictures. This helped me a lot. And when I got hired in 2016 by a big weekly newspaper my food blogging career really took off.

But the drinking? It remained.

I would try things such as 'one drink per hour' or 'no shots on a school night' but that would fall to crap if I had to cover some culinary event or be at a restaurant opening. And if you're drunk one night and feel like poo the next day well, heck, the only way to feel better is to have some more drinks! Sure I felt like garbage most days, my gut had become this bulbous extremity and I was getting absolutely no personal work done but, hey!, that's just how it goes right?

How many mornings did I say to myself in the bathroom "Someday I'll feel good"? Too many. So when the day came and losing donuts in your garden on a beautiful spring afternoon I knew that I had reached my limit.

So to speak.

Just can't get enough, so good when it hits your lips

So far the cutting back in the drinking has proved totally awesome.

We drink enough, like 2-3 cocktails (if that), to relax and get a buzz but then if we start to feel a bit woozy we stop, take a big drink of water and read until we fall sleep. Sounds boring but when you reach a certain age and you've been doing it for a while, and quite furiously, it's nice to just be an old dullard.

Because of my full time day job, part time food writing and having a wife and life I realized that I haven't actually finished a book in over a year. That's dumb for a guy that prides himself on being a bit of a bookworm and, well, a writer, but my new found 'sobriety' has cured that.

My sleep state dreams have gotten back to being full on epic again now that I am not passing out at night. Which I love. If there is anything that I am really addicted to it'd be dreaming. Some mornings I would find myself sleeping way past my normal 8 hours because the more I sleep the crazier my dreams become. And speaking of sleeping, when I wake up now I am not nauseous or murky and when I go check on the garden I do not have the inclination to vomit in it. Which is always a plus.

And this is a big one for me: my morning appetite is back! I haven't made myself a proper breakfast before work in, like...forever. We're talking eggs, toast, maybe a heaping bowl of good oatmeal, a bagel with veggies and cream cheese. It has been a red hot minute since that has happened. And I like breakfast. Nope, scratch that: I fxxking love breakfast!

I find myself to be in a better mood throughout the day and, you know, I always prided myself on being a fairly pleasant person. I'm more focused on my writing and articles and projects get done with clarity and aplomb. Which is great. Plus another positive factor is that I am a cheaper date these days. It doesn't take a flagon of hooch to get me where I need to be. Just a couple here and there and, boom, I'm done. It's honestly not that hard. I just have to keep reminding myself on the days I would wake up and wish that I were dead because I was still drunk or the hangover was seriously settling in. It's just not fun anymore.

All of my friends that I used to get tanked with are all grown up, moved on, married with kids. I'm pretty sure they have quelled the alcohol beast because they have more important things to tend to. Like raising a frikkin' human. The only difference between us and them is that the wife and I do not want kids...and that is probably a factor for our debauchery; its just us. Just us and a cat. The cat doesn't care if we get faced as long as her bowl is full and her litter box is clean. After that she's just "Whatever humans...do whatever you want. Idiots."

On top of feeling generally better my stomach feels decidedly less bloated. Sure its still there and firmly middle aged firm but I can at least suck in the gut when I need to and sort of see my rib cage.

Sort of.

Now that the weather is getting less surface of the sun hot I plan on using my trainers to go on nightly walk/runs and even found an online workout program for guys my age and condition. I'm starting to feel good again. All I had to do was just tone it down a bit, show some restraint and grow up just a little more.

It's been too long and I just want to get back to the fairly sane and sober person that I have always been. Sane meaning not blitzed out of his head most nights - it takes a certain self obsessed maniac to want to type furiously about your life and how you feel about food - so I got that going for me. I just like feeling like the old Mark again and this is something I can really get used to.

Although I do crave that mesquite smoked whiskey now and then. But I'll have to save that for a special occasion. And definitely not on a school night. For sure.

Thanks for reading...

This happy kid, many years before taking his first drink

Telling it like it is
"Metal" Mark Whittaker
First Week of Autumn, 2017

Metal Influence:

MUNICIPAL WASTE

"Drunk as Shit"

You've Had The Food at the Annual Greek Fest, Now Learn How To Make Them! (And Something About Ouzo)

This blog post is being written under much duress.

When we started working on this post, several, shall we say..."obstacles" began heading our way.

First off, the car died. Like flat out just wont start. And when our trusted mechanic of several years is just staring into the maw of our engine, scratching his bald head and going, "Yeah...this one is a mystery to me", you know we are doomed. So that prevented us from getting anywhere to do a piece with a bit more meat attached to it. All the images you see on this post are uploads from the internet. Not our usual way of going about things. Sucks.

Next up was a complete blackout in our neighborhood. Literally, the few blocks surrounding us, and no one else, was dark for most of Wednesday September 21st. We lost a bit of work and had to wait till the lights came back on (later that night) to save what could be saved, so this post isn't as awesome as we thought it would be. Sorry about that.

Not to mention a blackout in 100 degree heat just kept us quiet and drinking cool water as the central air was off and slowly, as the day progressed, it became a bit swampy in the Tucson Homeskillet compound. Not fun. And without a car, we were stuck there.

But...whatever. We press on! Let's do this.

It's autumn which can only mean one thing: Pumpkin spiced 40oz of malt liquor!

(Wow...that would be weird wouldn't it?)

No. Actually the autumnal equinox means that the annual Greek Festival at St. Demitrios Church on Ft. Lowell begins. It's a four day bacchanalia celebrating not just Greek culture, but, and this is most important, Greek food and drink. We attend every year and for us the Greek Fest means that the good weather is about to start here in Tucson, the holiday season is upon us and the next day, after much Greek hedonistic mirth, a slight headache from the tall cans of Keo beer and many shots of Ouzo is to be had. Hey....tradition!

Last year we were lucky to be privy to the backstage area of the cooking tent, getting deep with those assembling gyro sandwiches, doling out dolmas and making the flames rise high as saganaki gets drenched in clear booze on a hot skillet.

So to attempt something new, we thought maybe this year we'd try out some recipes inspired by some of the cuisine you might partake of at the Greek Festival. At least some of our favorites. We got as close as we could to what they create during the annual event and we hope you enjoy the following dishes (and drinks!) as much as we do.

And speaking of flaming cheese, the saganaki is the first item up for your cooking consideration.

Saganaki

Upon entering the Greek Festival, outside of the lines of crafts, jewelry and dancing going on, you are usually met with someone yelling "Opa!" as flashes of fire extend from a searing hot pan. That means that saganaki, or "flaming cheese", is being made. It's one of our favorites and is always a great way to start off the festivities. 

The cheese is gooey with a light crust from the frying and alcohol char with a quick splash of lemon to round it all off, giving it a well deserved citrus note. 

Saganaki is crazy delicious and fairly simple to prepare. You just have to be a little brave is all because cooking with face high fire might have you cry "AHH!" instead of "OPA!"

Check it out and good luck:

1 slab of Greek cheese, such as Halloumi or Kasseri, about 1/2 inch thick and trimmed of any rind

1 heaping Tbsp. of olive oil

All-purpose flour for dredging

1/2 shot glass of Ouzo (we'll get to that later...)

Wedge of lemon

Pre-heat a heavy-bottomed skillet (a cast-iron pan works very well) to a medium-high heat. Place your slab of cheese under running tap water then dredge in all-purpose flour. Shake off any excess flour.

 

Add your olive oil to the skillet. Add a sprinkle of flour into the pan to test if the oil is hot enough. As soon as it sizzles, add your cheese to the skillet and sear for a couple of minutes. Carefully flip the cheese with a spatula and allow to sear for a couple of minutes on the other side.

Turn off your heat source and carefully carry your cheese saganaki to your table and pour the brandy ( or Ouzo) over the cheese and ignite with a lighter. Move your head back, shout “OPA!” and squeeze the wedge of lemon over the cheese.

Serve immediately with crusty bread, some Ouzo and a can of Keo beer.

Tzatziki

Look, just like Indian cuisine, we leave the complicated food prep to the professionals. Trying to recreate the flavors of gyro spit meat cannot be duplicated in a small kitchen such as ours. But we can get down with a mean tzaziki.

Tzatziki is great on its own with just some bread but we also like it with shwarma and, of course, a meaty gyro sandwich or gyro plate. It adds a bit of texture, cools down the heat a bit and makes the girth of bread and beef go down a little smoother.

Lemony, dilly and....cucumbery(?), a good tzatziki can make any Greek dish brighter and more yogurty(?). Nevermind.

Anyway, here is what we came up with:

2 cups plain Greek yogurt

2 cups diced cucumber (or shredded)

½ cup fresh dill - minced

¼ cup lemon juice

2 garlic cloves - grated

½ teaspoon salt

¼ teaspoon pepper

Combine all ingredients in a medium bowl check for seasoning. Add more dill, lemon, garlic or salt/pepper to your taste.

Serve immediately or store in the refrigerator for up to 5 days.

Pastitsio

Now here is where things get serious.

At its essence, pastitsio is Greek lasagna. And...its amazing.

Just layers of seasoned meat sauce, baked pasta and, of course, lots of cheese. The best part about real authentic pastitsio is the addition of a bechamel sauce. It really adds a whole level of flavor but, unfortunately, can make this recipe a bit time consuming and tricky. In the end though, it is very worth it.

This year you can find pastitsio in the fancier dining area as the Greek Fest people have separated the food stations into "street" and "dinner service". It makes sense because years past you just find yourself winding through an endless line that reminds you of a busy day at Disneyland, except at the end you get incredible Greek food rather than a ten second ride with R2-D2s and Buzz Lightyears and stuff bleeping and blooping you into near psychedelic hysteria.

Forget that....let's get cooking!

The Meat Sauce

1 ½ lbs. ground veal (or beef, though minced lamb can also be used)

1 large or 2 medium-sized yellow onion(s), finely diced

2 bay leaves

2 cloves of garlic, grated

1 ½ cups fresh strained tomato juice (or ¼ cup tomato paste diluted in 1½ cups of water.)

¼ cup white wine

¼ cup - ⅓ cup Greek extra virgin olive oil

Salt and pepper to taste

The Pasta

1 lb. of Greek pasta (or Bucatini, or Ziti)

2 tbsp. Greek extra virgin olive oil

3 egg whites, beaten (the yolks will be used in the béchamel sauce)

¼ cup grated Kefalotyri (or Parmesan cheese if you try but cannot find the Greek cheese)

The Béchamel Sauce

4 cups of scalded milk

1 cup all-purpose flour

¾ cup grated Kefalotyri cheese (or, you know, Parm) 

½ cup of salted butter

3 egg yolks, well beaten

½ - 1 teaspoon of ground nutmeg

½ teaspoon fresh ground black pepper

Heat the olive oil in a large pan and sauté the diced onions over a medium heat until soft. Add the ground veal to the pan and break it up thoroughly. Keep stirring constantly over a medium high heat for 5 minutes or so to brown all of the meat and mingle it completely with the onion.

Once the meat is completely browned, add the rosemary, garlic, wine, and the fresh tomato juice (or tomato paste diluted in water) to the pan along with salt and pepper to taste, and mix well. Bring to a boil, add the bay leaves and make sure to immerse them in the sauce, then reduce the heat to medium-low and cover the pan with its lid leaving it only slightly uncovered to allow the excess water to evaporate as steam. Simmer for about 30 minutes or so. Stir the sauce occasionally. When ready, the meat will have absorbed the liquid in the pan. Remove the bay leaves and set aside when done.

Bring a large pot of water to a rolling boil, add the pasta to the water and parboil it until soft but not fully cooked (about 3/4 of the suggested cooking time on the package).

While the pasta is cooking, make the béchamel sauce. Start by melting the butter in a deep saucepan over a medium heat, then, using a whisk or immersion blender with a whisk attachment, slowly incorporate the flour by adding it to the melted butter in stages while stirring continually to avoid the formation of lumps. Once the flour has been fully incorporated, slowly add the hot milk while continuing to constantly stir the butter and flour paste to ensure a smooth consistency. Once the milk has been added, remove the saucepan from the heat and add the grated cheese, nutmeg, pepper and egg yolks in that order while continuing to rapidly stir the mixture. Set aside when smooth and well-mixed. However, do not let it stand for too long without a good stirring as you do not want the top to start congealing. By this point your pasta should be ready.

Drain the water completely from the pasta pot and return pot with pasta to the heat, add the two tablespoons of olive oil to the pasta and mix well to ensure a thorough coating of oil as we do not want the pasta to get sticky. Remove the pot from the heat, let stand for a few minutes to cool and then add the egg whites to the pasta, along with the ¼ cup of grated Kefalotyri cheese and mix well, then set aside momentarily.

Rub a little olive into the sides and bottom of your baking dish, and then add about two-thirds of the pasta to the dish to form a bottom layer. Make sure to spread the pasta evenly in order to completely cover the bottom of the dish, make sure not to leave any empty spaces.

Spread the meat sauce over top of the bottom pasta layer, ensuring to distribute it evenly and right to the edges of the casserole. The meat layer must be of uniform thickness and must not have any gaps.

Add the remaining pasta over top of the meat layer, distributing it evenly.

Pour the béchamel sauce over of the final pasta layer, make sure to cover the entire surface area of the dish.

Place the casserole uncovered in an oven pre-heated to 350°F (180°C) and bake for approximately 30 minutes, or until the béchamel sauce is golden brown.

Remove casserole from oven and set aside to cool before serving. As already mentioned above, this dish is best served on the following day after its baking. However, if you must eat it on the same day, make sure it has a chance to cool for at least 30 minutes before cutting it into pieces. Do not make the mistake of cutting it before it has had a chance to cool, you will end up with messy servings. Cut it only when it has cooled, (ideally overnight in the refrigerator) and warm the pieces before serving.

Loukoumades

Luckily there are vittles at the Greek Festival that wont damage your waistline or wallet. If you're just looking for a sweet treat, look no further than the honey speckled, deep fried goodness of loukoumades.

If donut holes went Mediterranean, loukoumades would be it. There are variations on this snack; some top it with chocolate sauce, sometimes honey, others sprinkle powdered sugar on them...you do what you want because any way you embellish them these lil' dough bites are tasty. But the recipe that follows is pretty straight forward Greek style and the walnuts add a well intended crunch.

Very unlike the pastitsio, these guys are fairly straight forward and simple but just be careful when you toss 'em in the hot oil.

If you had enough Metaxa, such as we did, you get a little heavy handed and throw them in like slammer Pogs and, trust us here, hot fryer oil kinda hurts. Buzzing heavily or not.

Lets go...

4½ cups + 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon instant dry yeast

1 tablespoon honey

2¼ cups warm water, divided

Vegetable oil, for frying

1-2 cups honey, for drizzling

Ground cinnamon, for sprinkling

Coarsely ground walnuts, for sprinkling

In a large bowl, mix 4½ cups flour and the salt. Dissolve the yeast in ½ cups warm water, together with 1 tablespoon honey and 1 tablespoon flour.

Make a well in the center of the flour and pour in the yeast mixture. Add the remaining 1¾ cups water. Mix using a spatula, until you get a sticky, loose batter. If the texture of the batter isn't like this, add more water to achieve the right consistency. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let raise for 2 hours, or until doubled in size.

Fill half of the pot with oil and heat to 375°F.

Now you need to shape your loukoumades. There are two ways to do that:

1) Oil your hands, take a handful of the batter and clench your fist around it. Squeeze out a knob of the batter between your fingers, scoop it up with an oiled tablespoon and drop into the hot oil.

2) Oil two tablespoons. Lift a little bit of the batter on one and push it off into the hot oil using another one.

The puffs are ready when they rise to the top and are light golden brown. Remove with a slotted spoon and dry on paper towels.

Drizzle with honey and sprinkle with cinnamon and walnuts.

Ouzo

Yeah, we're not going to give you a recipe for Ouzo...because, no. Again, leave the complicated items to the seasoned pros. Making your own Ouzo is essentially doing moonshine because this stuff is for real Greek airline fuel.

If you grew up drinking Ouzo then the hint of anise and the fact that just a few sips in you're breaking plates wont bother you. For most of us in western society, Ouzo is a curiosity and a "once in a while" liquid delicacy. As is the Greek Festival. It's literally the only time we drink it. But maybe you're different. Maybe you down the clear distilled hooch like cheap beer. And that's how we like to enjoy it, with a tall can of Mythos or Keo...again, only consumed at the Greek Fest.

What's fun about Ouzo is that if you put ice in it the liquor goes a milky color. Kind of like absinthe, the oil in the anise causes emulsion and if your friends are good n' drunk, lot and lots of rude names come to mind when you chill Ouzo with ice. But we usually drink it straight. Just get it over with.

Here's the tricky part: Sort of like tequila, Ouzo sneaks up on you. If you do a shot or three you wont notice an immediate intoxicating effect. That...comes later. After a few is when your pals Greg and Dakota are on the stage trying to do the traditional Tsamiko dance, totally wrecking it and embarrassing themselves but afterwards they roll up to you, warbling and slurring, and proclaim:

"Did you see us up there? Killed it!"

Just drink responsible kids. The cops are out in mega force during Greek Fest, so be sure to eat enough souvlaki and baklava to soak up the booze before you hit the road home to cook up these delicious dishes.

Above all though...just have fun! We always do.  If you like what you ate at the Greek Fest then give these recipes a shot. Most are pretty easy, one takes a bit of time but all in all if you can't get to the festival this year, at least you can eat, and drink, like you did.

Ya sou!

Typing, Taste Testing and Uploads
"Metal" Mark Whittaker
Getting Ready for the Greek Festival, 2016

Metal Influence:

MUNICIPAL WASTE

"The Fatal Feast"