If you make gyro meat, what is your best "go-to" recipe for it?

Here’s my go-to recipe for wrap-style pita - have been making it for years without a single fail. My photo is from a previous batch.

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It’s really pretty good (reduced rosemary as mentioned above, though). I used to use a recipe from a blog written by a lady in England who grew up in Greece, but my searches no longer find her blog (and I didn’t save it) so maybe it’s defunct now. But this recipe was very similar to hers (both from memory of her seasoning mix and taste memory).

I did blitz all the herbs/spices in a coffee grinder (blade-type) first because I find biting into pieces of dried rosemary or thyme off-putting.

For the tzatziki I just used ~ equal amounts of yogurt and grated cucumber (squeezed dry in cheesecloth) with lemon juice, olive oil, dill, salt and a bit of minced mint. I won’t go buy mint just for making tzatziki but my daughter had some leftover. She’s been making jars of syrups (lavender[1], mint, vanilla) for her teas.

[1] Seems you can get anything from Amazon nowadays. Big ol’ bag of lavender blossoms. Just to make syrup. :crazy_face:

Thanks! Those look really nice and I’ve saved the recipe. It’s similar in nature/process to the one I used but the egg and extra sugar (1/4 cup honey being about 3X the sugar I used) should make the final product better.

You can’t tell from the photo (which I didn’t think to snap until after I’d bagged the leftovers) but mine are probably only about 1/2 as thick as yours. Still, I was surprised at how thick they were once cooked - about a cm - given I’d rolled them out to about 2 mm or less.



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Definitely did not want pockets for the gyro. But they have their place. I like stuffing them with a bunch of charcuterie and drizzling in some kind of spiced mayo, cukes and tomato.

I make my son breakfast before school during the school year and cheesy scrambled eggs topped with sriracha in a pita pocket is a favorite.

I find thickness of Olga pitas depends on how large you roll them. I used to roll them bigger, and got a thinner wrap. For some reason I drifted to smaller, and they notably increased in height.

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I prefer lavash for the thinness. Thicker bread turns it into a gut bomb and dilutes the importance of the meat.

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Ah - I wasn’t paying attention to your diameter, just the thickness. They look to be about 6 inches? I just checked and mine are 8.5-9 inches, so I rolled them out pretty thin.


Something else I forgot. My beef was 90/10 so I was going to use Kenji’s method to add some bacon in the mix for fat content, but didn’t want to thaw a pound just for that. So I added 6 tablespoons of duck fat.

I hear you. I really wanted to have seconds but didn’t want that much bread again, so I just dumped the filling components onto my plate and ate with a fork.

Would lavash hold up though? I’d think you’d end up with chunks poking through once the tzatziki had soaked in a bit.

I like the folding pita, laffa , lavash or pocket pita that are fresh. They all make a good wrapper as long as they’re fresh.

I find, usually, the places with folding pita keep very fresh pitas, whereas the pocket type might be less likely to be fresh at places that aren’t run by Greeks, Israelis or other Mediterranean people.

A couple places I visit offer a choice of pocket pita or lavash.

Where I order, the lavash, while thinner, is much bigger, so the amount of carbs is probably more than a typical 10 inch round folded pita.

My current Lebanese restaurant bakes small pocket pitas all day long, roughly half the size of a grocery store pita.

I’m open to whatever is fresh.

If I was going to eat the bread by itself, laffa is my favourite.

How about just a lettuce leaf?

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I just eat the meat and throw out the pita. No need for lettuce . Most Greek places also let you order the gyro meat or souvlaki without carbs. Or, on top of salad.

It’s too hot to grow lettuce in most parts of Greece during the summer, so that’s why you tend to see Village Salad instead of lettuce / tomato/ feta salad with the souvlaki if you order it in Greece.

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That sounds about right.

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It’s fine to eat without pitta/bread. Do an image search for “Dönerteller”. Basically, it’s everything on a plate. Sauces, meat, vegetables, your choice of chips or pitta/bread.

Also, “kebab” can be sliced meat or pieces of meat fried in a pan. However, the meat is on on a spit and shaved like Döner/Gyros.

Re seasoning. Make sure you use lots of good oregano.

Been looking at some photos of gyro and kebab I ate in Greece and seeing no pitta pockets, only fluffy folded kind.

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I rarely do gyro, but often do falafel (which is frequently served up the same way). I’ll do it in pita, lettuce leaves, or lacking either just do it up like this…

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@ScottinPollock - You just reminded me (again) that I need to make falafel. I don’t think I’ve made any since around Christmas.

@Presunto - I don’t think I’d know good oregano if it jumped up and kicked me in the shin. I just use McCormick or Spice Island (whichever one was bogo when I was getting close to needing more).

@Phoenikia - the ME restaurant I and my son frequent (it’s their falafel I’m trying to replicate, and getting a bit closer each time) makes pita and several other kinds of breads and baked sweet treats and claims to be “a major regional distributor”. Not sure how much of the claim is hot air, but their food’s good. Lamb shank platters were $12 for years! They went up to $16 last year and now jumped again to $19.

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I use whatever oregano- Greek, turkish, Mexican, dried or fresh

Kebab in North America is typically souvlaki or kalamaki. It’s skewered meat, on the grill in North America.

Cevapi and cevapcici, from the same root, is minced. Still traditionally grilled.

Generally, in North America, kofte kebab, kefte kabob and cevap are the only types of kebab that are made with minced meat.

I realise Kebab is used differently in Western Europe.

I’ve never seen anyone in Canada or the States fry kebab in a pan and call it kebab.

Kebab means cooked on a skewer in Canada and the US.

That’s why caprese kabobs, fruit kabobs, antipasto kabobs and candy kabobs exist. It is referring to the skewer, not the way the meat is cooked in North America.

Realise Kabob could be interchangeable with Doner, and that Doner Kebab is the full word for Doner, because it’s on a Spit. Kebab in Belgium, Germany etc is probably used differently.

I know all of that.

Same, until I ate it in Albania. Simply pieces of meat fried in a pan with kebab spice mix, not paste and not stacked on a spit.

For the skewers the specific name they use is shish kebap. But I ordered just “kebab”.

Anyway, sorry OP for going off-topic. Should be in another thread.

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No worries and no need to apologize. I’m happy to keep learning and like tangents.


Or their Persian cousin, called koobideh. I think it’s about the same as kofte but heavier on the sumac and I think has some coriander and turmeric. I’ve had it as minced beefsteak, lamb, and ground chicken.

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I cook kababs in a pan all the time. Never grilled.

In india, they’d only be grilled (ie cooked in a tandoor) if you’re eating them at a restaurant. At home — in a pan.

North American interpretations are… interpretations. (Also: “kabOb” — can someone tell me where the O came from?!)

Back to the OP - I saw an interesting chicken version for home where marinated boneless thighs are stacked/pressed down vertical (on a skewer to hold them in place) and cooked in the oven, then sliced down and crisped in a pan to emulate the end result of the spit-roasted version. Need to try. (Sorry OP - not the ground meat version — I eat those out, though I have eyed TJ’s ready version…)

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Adana kebab. Turkish spiced ground meat. Uh-MAZing :drooling_face:

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