Most of the people visiting the annual Greek Festival at St. Demetrius Church in Seattle come for a brief sampling of another culture. For me, however, the event provoked nostalgia. After all, I lived in Greece for over fifteen years. My ex-wife and I raised our family there; we bought a house there; our kids went to the public schools; in summer we frequented the incomparably beautiful beaches. During the course of several conversations with people staffing the booths, I discovered that I’d spent more time in Greece than most of them. No matter. Besides the desire to stir up pleasant memories from some of the best years of my life, I was hoping to pick up some tasty Greek specialties that are all but impossible to find most times of the year.

I arrived when it opened at ten on a Saturday morning near the end of September 2024. That meant that I’d miss the music and dancing that was scheduled for later, but I’d also miss the heavy crowds, so the people running the booths had more time to chat. When they learned that I’d lived in Greece, we’d compare the locations I lived in with where their relatives were from.

The first place I wandered into was the gift shop, which sold jewelry, clothing, candles, paintings, sculpture, icons, books, and other items. I looked for Greek-language books for children but there were few, and then I realized that it didn’t make sense to buy anything for my grandson from there: at that very moment he was on vacation in Greece with his parents, and it would be much easier to find appropriate Greek-language educational products at the source. Plus, to be honest, most items were beyond my budget.

From there I wandered through the food venues. There was a room devoted to the sale of alcoholic beverages by the glass, including a wine-tasting booth. A taverna set up under a vast tent out back sold Greek cuisine such as lamb, roast chicken, moussaka, pastitsio, tiropita, spanakopita, kalamari, souvlaki, gyro, and other dishes. It was in the deli, though, where I made most of my purchases to take home and consume at my leisure. Just before Greek Easter, which occurred in May this year, I’d made a futile search for tsoureki, the special sweet Easter bread; here at the deli they had it in abundance, so I bought a loaf. I also bought some halva with almonds, some traditional holiday sweets called melomakarona and kourampiedes, some Halkidiki olives, and some feta cheese.

Later, after I had got home and broke out the goods, I was displeased with some of my purchases. The sweets and the olives were superb. However, the tsoureki bread was too dry; it crumbled when I tried to cut it. The tsoureki we’d bought in Greece when I lived there and that my ex-wife sent or my sons brought back to the States after visits was soft and easy to cut, and it pulled apart reluctantly. And the feta cheese from the festival was a bit rubbery instead of moist and crumbly. I didn’t expect the food to taste the same as the food we used to eat in Greece. Too many variables stand in the way of replicating the totality of the experience. Even so, I had supposed that the various tastes would help me recall good times thriving in Greece when my kids were young. In a video call with my ex I voiced my complaints, suggesting the possibility that they had sold me stale tsoureki. Not so, she emphasized. Tsoureki was made in two fashions, one dry and one softer and moister. It just happened that they served the dry style at the festival. As for the feta, it was made in diverse ways as well, and some people preferred the firmer version. This somewhat mitigated my irritation, but it also made me realize that to get the Greek food I remembered eating when we raised our family there, I’d probably have to pay a visit to get back to the source.