Summer Reruns

Back in the dark ages when I was young, summertime did not make for particularly great television watching.

There would be wonderful old movies on past a certain hour, but most of the prime time viewing fare featured reruns. Long before TIVO or DVR features allowed us to devise our own viewing schedules, it was not altogether unpleasant although totally mandatory somehow to sit together and watch our favorite episodes rebroadcast. Whatever choices we had made to watch a particular show during the regular season, it seemed unthinkable to watch anything else once the reruns began.

Seeing certain shows again could be a bit more of a relaxed experience however, especially while I was still young and naive enough not to have figured out that the stars of these shows, the people we tuned in to see, while they might be placed in predictable enough jeopardy, would not ever be killed off in a weekly episode.

Yes, for an otherwise bright little girl, I admit, it took me an embarrassingly long time to figure out that the main characters in a series would never actually die on the show. For whatever reason my family mostly only watched TV together, we never really talked about what we were watching. So there I would be, sitting casually to belie the fact I was tensely holding my breath, pretending I did not care in the least if my favorite character might have been captured or worse, fatally wounded, in the mayhem that drove any particular week's story line.

Looking back, I suppose it could be considered to my credit that I'd bought in so thoroughly to that contract between viewer and show premise requiring the suspension of disbelief. It exerted such a strong unspoken hold upon me that I never really allowed myself to consider what would happen to story arc of the show if, for example, they did indeed let The Fugitive catch that one-armed man.While I am on the subject allow me to indulge my inner Old Biddy just for a moment. To all of you so swooney over Clooney and his endearing squinting up at you gaze first used to wide effect as Dr. Doug Ross on ER?

I will call your Clooney and raise you my childhood doctor-crush, the beleaguered Dr. Richard Kimble, played by ruggedly handsome David Janssen. That's right, I'm talking about The Fugitive, falsely accused murderer battling week to week to clear his reputation and bring justice to the one-armed man who had brutally killed his love and ruined his happy life.*Sigh*

What do girl crushes on serial television actors have to do with anything?

Bear with me. As I thought about what we would have for dinner tomorrow night, I realized it was time to attempt my own rerun, a do-over of my previously way-too-garlicky, too chunkily cucumbered, Tzatziki Sauce.

Oh all right...groan if you will...it IS a stretch. Go ahead. I'll wait. [.................] All finished? Feel better now? Great. Let's talk Tzatziki.

While super doses of Allium Sativum might seem just what the doctor ordered for a feeling of extra security while watching any of the vampire dominant shows available this summer, garlic can be quite the palate pummeler, rendering you incapable of tasting anything but. I wanted to try tzatziki again, this time without so much garlic to spoil the fun.My previous attempt had also been gently criticized for being too chunky. My definition of "finely chop" when it came to the cucumber, and what was the commonly held expectation of predominantly creamy smoothness in a Tzatziki sauce were at odds. I was determined to right those wrongs and bring the one-armed man to justice at las.... wait, no, where was I?

Ah yes. I wanted to try the delightfully seasoned lamb patties from the Butcher's case at Wheatsville again, this time with a more authentic Tzatziki sauce to serve alongside. A Tzatziki not plagued by garlic overload or too large bits of cuke. Off to the interweb I rode, to find another recipe to try.

And therein lies the rub, if not the sauce. There are as many versions of a Tzatziki sauce as there are television stars inspiring little girl crushes. [Results 1 - 10 of about 158,000 for tzatziki recipe] Some form of a creamy cucumber garlic yogurt sauce is served in so many different regional cuisines, you could go crazy trying to determine what would constitute an "authentic" version.

Unlike the locked down old school version of a summer rerun schedule, I had choices, way too many choices, about which direction to take the seasoning of the sauce.Mint? Which kind of mint? Oregano? Dill? Aaaargh!

What type of green bits did I want to add to elevate this concoction from garlic yogurt to that something more that is Tzatziki?

With so many different sets of directions to follow, there were way too many maps offered to choose much less chart a true course. After a bit of hand wringing over not finding that definitive recipe, I decided to abandon any quest for authenticity.

Tzatziki is a sauce that reflects the time and place and tastes of its maker. I felt liberated to prepare a sauce "to taste" and rightfully declare it my Tzatziki sauce.

I shortcut a day in the prep by using already drained and thickened Greek Yogurt as a base. I seeded and grated the cucumber this go-round. No more "not fine enough" chopping for me! I made a paste of part of one garlic clove, some oregano from the garden, and red wine vinegar with equal amounts of olive oil.

This last bit was inspired by a recipe coming from a young Greek woman who stated this was how her grandmother (and namesake) taught her to make Tzatziki. I had no-fat yogurt so figured the olive oil couldn't hurt. Many recipes call for the addition of lemon juice (except for those that don't!) so the acidity from the vinegar would not be so far fetched.

I may not know Tzatziki from tsathoggua, but I do know better than to mess with Greek grannies (knocks wood and throws salt preemptively over shoulder).

I ended up with a container that holds what looks like a perfectly respectable homage to Tzatziki. The elements in the sauce will spend the day and night together in the refrigerator, getting acquainted, so they can properly introduce each other tomorrow when they reappear beside the lamb patties. Whether or not the greatly reduced amount of garlic will stand in line politely with the rest of the flavors remains to be seen.It looks like Tzatziki sauce but how will it taste? Will the garlic insist on running the show? Will the cucumber bits be fine enough to please a studio audience? Tune in for the next episode of Austin Agrodolce when all will be revealed.

Tzatziki Sauce!

OVERPOWERING GARLIC ALERT/ADDENDUM!! CODE RED - SOUND THE ALARMS!!! The recipe that follows calls for what we here at AustinAgrodolce, in consultation with Significant Others Who Shall Remain Nameless have determined is too much garlic. WAY too much garlic.

So much garlic in fact that, if Sookie Stackhouse tried this recipe (it could happen!) her vampire boyfriend Bill would drop her like a silver cross. It is our considered opinion that you try this with one clove of garlic and add more only if you think you need to. This is supposed to be a cool sauce after all and the 4 cloves of garlic moved it over into hot garlicky territory. Not awful, just not tzatziki.

It was also agreed upon in further discussions that the "chop finely" instructions for the cucumber did not specify that the degree of teensiness desired from the chopping would be as if you ran the cukes through your food processor and stopped just when they were at risk of stopping being discretely tiny bits and becoming a cucumber mash. In other words - use your processor to chop the cucumbers very very finely. We clear on that now? Good. Proceed!

You know how sometimes trying something new completely gives you the heebie jeebies?

So much so that you find all sorts of reasons (appearing to rational outsiders as "excuses") not to ever actually try the recipe out?

These are those recipes, you know the ones, where you pretend you will try them only to actually read them and discover they involve two hours of something sitting dripping into a pan. Or they require a specific kind of vinegar or a special whisk or something, anything, so long as it is something you don't have or forgot to get, so you bail.

Over. And Over. Again.

This heebie-jeebizing is what has kept me from making tzatziki sauce for months now.

At first I didn't have plain yogurt in sufficient quantities and I was concerned cutting the recipe in half wouldn't yield a reasonable amount. I also didn't have a very sharp knife and it calls for a lot of finely chopped bits. The Hub often doesn't like tangy stuff much. LawSchoolGirl doesn't particularly care for mint.

So why, you might wonder, did I keep thinking I wanted to make tzatziki? Because, that's why. Because when I had the sauce with gyros in Salt Lake City Utah where we used to live 148 years ago I really really liked it.Because it is summer time and in summer time I like to eat cucumbers every possible way. Tzatziki sauce is, after all, at least partly about the chopped cucumbers.

Because everywhere I turn for the past two weeks; newsletters, Food Network shows, you name it, I have been bumping into lamb or other Greek style burger patties served with some version of a tzatziki sauce.Wheatsville's Gurus of Meat now offer seasoned lamb sausage patties that look scrumptious so I bought some. I wanted something authentic to serve with them and tzatziki sauce isn't just fun to type and fun to say it was screaming at me that it was JUST THE VERY THING TO SERVE WITH LAMB PATTIES FOR DINNER. IMMEDIATELY. IF NOT SOONER!

Of course I'd forgotten you have to let yogurt drip for at least two hours first so I bumped the lamb patties from dinner one night to dinner the next night to allow sufficient time over the bowl.

I have a great new knife (thank you again from the bottom of my chopping block, chef son!) so the many finely chopped ingredients in tzatziki now represent a joyful aspect to the recipe prep rather than a challenge.

I have basil growing out back which I feel is a decent substitute for mint for my non-mint fan in the house.

I have a few Hawaiian sweet bread rolls on hand I need to use up, rolls that are foods of the gods and will serve as the perfect foil for a seasoned lamb pattie with a tangy sauce, sooooooo.........

Having knocked all my potential objections out of the way, tzatziki sauce time it is. I put the recipe elements together so they could rub shoulders and do the Vulcan Flavor Meld in the refrigerator all day.

It is nearly dinnertime now and I did a followup taste test an hour or so ago and noted the garlic was absolutely kicking ass. I did use one ginormous clove as two of the suggested four cloves and in so doing I may have inadvertently bumped up the garlickity quotient of the flavor profile by about 80 percent.

Hey - that is a risk I, as a committed garlic lover, am quite willing to take. Not much of a risk really as I think the flavor of the lamb can stand up to as much garlic tangyness we can throw at it honestly. Especially in combination with buttery couscous and a Hawaiian sweet roll.

Just at the moment I can barely type for my stomach growling in anticipation. My mouth is watering so much my keyboard is in jeopardy. For whatever reason, after months of playing with the idea and coming up with lame excuses not to? Now that I have finally made the daggum tzatziki sauce I am absolutely chafing to have it be dinner time already [!!!] so we can just eat some for heaven's sake.

Can anything live up to the hype my feverishly anticipatory brain is concocting? Man, I sure enough hope so.

I hate recipe letdown more than you can imagine.

At the moment however everything is all sweetness and light and Man I Can't WAITness. Dinner Tonight: Seasoned Lamb Patties from Wheatsville served with Tzatziki Sauce, Buttery CousCous, Hawaiian Sweet Bread Rolls and sliced fresh fruit. Yum yum yum yum yum. I think.Here is the recipe I used - Alton Brown's version from the Food Network. I let my yogurt drip overnight so may be slightly short the 1 1/2 cup mark but what I've got is pretty close. I've thrown other substitutions and notes in parens. In several other recipes I found they suggested at least a two hour resting period in the reefer so as previously noted I made mine this morning so it could sit.

TZATZIKI SAUCE
•16 ounces plain yogurt
•1 medium cucumber, peeled, seeded, and finely chopped
•Pinch kosher salt
•4 cloves garlic, finely minced (I used 3 because one of them was HUGELY large)
•1 tablespoon olive oil
•2 teaspoons red wine vinegar (I got a little splashy with this - may be closer to 3 tsp)
•5 to 6 mint leaves, finely minced (I subbed 5 large basil leaves from the garden)

Place the yogurt in a tea towel, gather up the edges, suspend over a bowl, and drain for 2 hours in the refrigerator. Place the chopped cucumber in a tea towel and squeeze to remove the liquid; discard liquid. In a medium mixing bowl, combine the drained yogurt, cucumber, salt, garlic, olive oil, vinegar, and mint. Serve as a sauce for gyros. Store in the refrigerator in an airtight container for up to a week.

Yield: 1 1/2 cups

And, drumroll please.....HOW did it turn out? Great, thanks! LawSchoolGirl noted most gyro sauces are more blended than chopped so I may give the sauce we have left a whirlygo in the food processor and use that in pita pocketed lunch versions of the leftover lamb. It was pretty durn garlic intensive but garlic is good for you, and we will happily be in Vampire Avoidant territory for a day or so as a result. Maybe mosquito repellent as well.I am not sure why I have such trouble learning and holding on to the lesson that trying a new recipe is more often fun than terrorizing, even if it does not turn out precisely as planned. There are areas in life where I consider myself to be a quick study, but learning to be more adventurous in the kitchen is not one of them, obviously. That said, Tzatziki sauce is no longer a stranger in this household so I look forward to many many more visits. Opa!