on Ouzo Toasts: Tasting the Devil
The “ouzo effect,” or “louche effect,” takes place when you pour water into one of the aniseed boozes. These are raki, pastis, ouzo, absinthe, arak, and sambuca. Lately, ouzo and sambuca have been my go-to’s for after dinner toasts. The liqueur begins clear or slightly colored (green, in absinthe’s case) but upon contact with water it turns a milky white as if transmogrified into the semen of the devil. This phenomenon occurs because the essential oil trans-anethole, also known as the flavoring compound anise camphor, is strongly hydrophobic: the oil has been dissolved in alcohol but when water is introduced it freaks out, turning the liquid opaque.
The association between aniseed and opacity feels spiritually right, because the merest whisper of aniseed on the air turns my world into a black void composed entirely of disgust. It is a total phobia. Trans-anethole is essentially what we know as anise, but it also gives that characteristic flavor to fennel, licorice, camphor, magnolia blossoms, and star anise. Fennel in a salad? No. The German candy Pfeffernusse? Fuck you. Licorice mixed in with normal candy? Somebody mace me, for the love of God.
As the dreaded black plastic tray heads my way, laden with shots and borne aloft in a cheerful hand, I pray for tequila but God does not listen.
Aniseed essential oil comes from the plant anise, Latin name Pimpinella anisum. This is not the same plant as star anise, which I can tolerate, or Japanese star anise (Illicium verum and Illicium anisatum, respectively), although those unrelated spices do also contain anethole. Growing in the eastern Mediterranean and in Southwest Asia, the name “anise” derives from the Arabic word yaānsuūn (“يَانْسُون). It is a herbaceous annual plant which grows about a meter high. The fruit of the plant is a schizocarp, which is a dry thing that splits into multiple carpels after falling.
The anise plant has a long history of medicinal use. The sixteenth century botanist John Gerard recorded that it could help with flatulence and also “stir up lust.” In the nineteenth century a Civil War nurse named Maureen Hellstrom tried to use anise seeds as an antiseptic. This was poisonous and did not carry on for long. Fishermen put anise on their lures to attract fish. British steam locomotive engineers put aniseed oil capsules into their metal ball bearings which broken when overheated, warning the driver with “the unmistakable smell of the fluid.”
Are you still reading? I imagine many of you got through the first two or three paragraphs until this all began to feel like a thesis paper and you were like fuuuuck this dude for making me read this bullshit. I’ve never written about origins of anything except my own fear of commitment. Much less some random spirit I’ve been drinking in excess at bars. But, you see, i can’t have just anyone reading this one. I need to weed out the people who are just here for the fratire. The truth is, I have spent a lot of time at bars lately because I am in this weird place. I somehow managed to fuck up two separate relationships in a single calendar year. It’s almost like someone would really have to try to be that bad at dating. And yet to me it has come quite naturally!
While staring down at this ouzo shot, it hit me: this dating thing has been a problem for years.
In the dwindling years of the last decade I woke with sticky elbows and missing cash about thrice a week. In the spots I was frequenting — shitty clubs and cheap pubs across the globe — it was normal for the entire bar to be coated in a half-evaporated layer of cheap tequila. It was fun. Nevermind the hangovers. I would wake up, slam a stiff shot or drink the leftover warm open beer, make myself an Irish coffee, and get to work. I’ve never quite understood why this self-destructive behavior had been so popular in my life. But it has, as well as the rotating door of degenerates that have been more than happy to help me explore that side of me. The bottle and those who drank from it with me at 8am without compunction have been the most reliable pieces of my life for years.
This time around is different. Sure, I’m still at bars. But I’m not there until last call, over-extending my welcome. A bit more self-aware these days, I now know when to call it a night. The tough part, the part I currently struggle with, is not being able to stay home alone. Being home is miserable these days. Working in the bar industry long enough, I now have an entire rolodex of comrades willing to head out on a Tuesday night and get into a bit of trouble. And boyyy, do they like trouble. Admittedly, I’m afraid of getting lost in this lifestyle. It’s quite addicting to visit or frequent a good bar where the staff welcomes you with your regular drink. This, however, is beginning to take its toll. My mornings have existed only in extremes: Responsibile Christian wakes up feeling refreshed. Fasted cardio, lots of water, some coffee. Or Asshole Christian can enjoy a spectrum of revulsion: waking up in a panic, popping an Advil and Adderall with a trembling hand, at times next to a woman with the sweet breath of a destitute alcoholic.
The only thing that separates these mornings is a simple text the night prior from one of tha homies: “What’s your plan for tonight?”
And so now here I am, seemingly an expert in Ouzo Toasts. It’s my new Malort. Except I actually enjoyed Malort. Ouzu tasts like marzipan and parma violets and soap with cardamom. It tastes like the talcumy texture of powder you’d find amidst the inventory of an old woman’s overstuffed purse. It’s the equivalent of pissing on your shoes in an alley. It tastes like the billowing dark of a blackout and a hundred-year-old jar of sweets; each one laced with poison by an evil old woman.
So, my deepest disgust has three chief elements. There’s the flavor profile or anise camphor, which is a material fact of the botanical universe. Second, there is a world of aniseed sweets which goes along with the memory of being made by adults to eat what I myself did not want to eat. And finally, the alcohol. The accident of my birth in boozy Chicago. Put together, these have become a pillar of my sensory being. I hate all three separately and just as much together. And yet I continue to drink this shit at bars with other forgottens.
I’m not sure I know anybody else who hates aniseed this much, nor do I think that my interpretation of the anise essential oil flavor is right any more than the natural fact of the ouzo effect feels right, right now. I know I won’t always belong in these bars at these hours, but at this moment I feel okay. One day will come when it doesn’t feel okay anymore, and I hope I can acknowledge it and exit gracefully. I don’t want to be that guy who is trying to keep the party going at 2am on a Wednesday. Not today or ever. That shit is especially sad the older you get. A drunk 30-year old at last call can be funny given the right circumstances. A drunk 40-year old at last call is a bummer. I understand how that lifestyle is tough to walk away from. What the fuck else am I supposed to do in my 30’s? Update my LinkedIn? Go to Coachella?
I suppose this is a good place to finish. My disgust in this liquor and what it represents in my life testifies to the existence of the world as I see it; a world of tastes which I can access through my tongue alone. Like love, hate is a subjective experience that returns you to your body, alone in your feelings but certain of them. What makes a good man? Turns out, everyone has a different answer. For me, right now, being a good man means doing what is best for myself. And, in a weird and fucked up way, Ouzo Toasts with other lost souls is best for me right now. I love being a part of the Island of Misfit Toys.
Aniseed is my certainty, at least for the time being. But not forever. Until then, it’s always good to know what you do not want in your mouth. Or in your life.