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Gyro Meat
Forbe!
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I just came into possession of a third of a spit of gyro meat.
Don't ask me how, but I have connections.
Over the next 3 days I need to eat as much of this as possible but, I would rather not just eat gyros for 3 days.
I consider myself an avid chef, but I don't think I've even eaten this much lamb in my life, let alone owned this much.
I need ideas of what to make with this. Recipes please, with gyro meat.
Edit:
The meat has been frozen already and is thoroughly thawed, so freezing it for later is not an option, at least not until it has been thoroughly cooked.
Forbe! on
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Gyro hamburgers?
But really, just freeze anything you don't cook right away. There are a million uses for tasty meats.
Edit: Frack missed that edit....
I don't have the equipment for this, but you have inspired me to no end, sir.
Funny really, I only suggested this 2 days ago to freinds while waiting for my order in a takeaway which had one of those meat gryos.
The other customers can give me those 'man, you crazy' stares all they like
but to have my own perfectly roasted gyro anytime i want? HEAVEN
No, we have Gyros up here and we also have Donairs.
UK Study of Doner Kebabs - the link to the actual Lacors report is at the end of the FSA article I've posted. Makes scary reading if you're in the UK... Anyway... not to derail the thread - we are talking about EATING this monster, so lets get onto the good stuff....
They are notorious! I'd love to be the OP and scarf down 1/3rd of a doner roll, but man, it has a lot of calories and a lot of rubbish in it!
The way it's done here is to get a pitta bread, slice it open, add in generous helpings of the grilled meat (shaved off the still cooking spit!), with either a garlic mayonnaise, or a hot tomato/chilli sauce, with peppers
Or - a little differently - grill the pitta having applied liberal amounts of garlic mayo to the outside of it, and stuff it with the lamb, and some form of chilli sauce, lettuce, onions, tomatos.
Or, cook up some roasted potatos and a greek salad, and then eat the grilled meat with some natural yoghurt or Tzatziki sauce on the side...
Also - lots of people have it at the end of a drunken night out, laid on top of a bed of fries, with ketchup and or various types of bbq/mayo sauce. In the UK, it's amazingly popular, but extremely unhealthy, and also the content of the meat is "questionable" - it's basically mechanically reclaimed and then pressed
Man.... i am HUNGRY now.... might have to have one tonight!
I never finish anyth
Cook the couscous per the instructions on the box, but use the broth and add a pat of butter.
Chop up the gyro meat, throw it in a skillet with some butter, add some spices. Just enough to get the meat good and warm and extra spicey and add that to the couscous and enjoy.
You can also make wraps with slice of the meat. Put in peppers, yogurt, and pine nuts.
(Incidentally, the fundamental difference between donair/doner and gyros is cultural -- it's a food that transcends the Dardanelle straight, but the Turks hate it when you imply they're eating Greek food, and the Greeks hate it when you imply they're eating Turkish food. But as Shakespeare wrote, "What's in a name? A gyro by any other name would still be both savory and succulent."*)
*This line was changed because Romeo and Juliet is set in Verona, and the Italians hate it when you imply they're eating either Turkish or Greek food.
The responses so far have been pretty darn good. Gyro/Kebab meat as you know is pretty well seasoned, so you'll want to pair it with things that complement it/"bounce" off of it well to really have a party. Lets sum up what we've seen so far:
The "Donor" Kebab - This is what is commonly seen at a lot of Gyro places. Usually a toasted pita with thinly sliced strips of toasted/seared gyro meat mixed with a "Tzatki" (sp?) sauce, (Think, Greek version of ranch dressing) and vegetables (usually lettuce/tomato/onions/cucumbers/greek olives and sometimes a drizzling of Feta cheese.
Greek Gyro Salad - Get a nice hunk of Romaine lettuce and chop it up. Chop in some roma tomatoes, feta cheese, red onions cucumbers and your Italian dressing of choice. Sprinkle chopped Gyro meat over salad and you're good to go. (Alternatively, you can use the "Tzatki" sauce as the dressing, I've seen it served in restaurants this way as well.
Pasta Dishes - Hooboy this is going to encompass pretty much everything you can think of and has been mentioned, but here are some ideas.
Lamb Pesto w/ Angel Hair/Spaghetti - This will be a pretty forcefully flavored dish, pesto and lamb are both pretty strongly flavored but if you're looking for something that will wake up your tastebuds, then this will work well. Pretty much any store bought pesto will work, but I'd recommend sauteeing the Gyro meat with some minced onion/garlic before mixing in the pesto sauce to "awaken" the flavors already present in the Gyro meat.
Lamb Bolognase - Straightforward pasta with meat sauce. Once again, since we're dealing with a Lamb based meat, the fresher ingredients the better to better complement the meat. Try making your own fresh pasta sauce if you really want to set it off, but using store bought pasta can work too in a pinch. Lets see if I can recall my pasta sauce recipe here....
Makes about 1.5 quarts of sauce
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1/4 cup minced shallots
1/4 cup minced onion
5 cloves garlic, minced (Lots of garlic here, but it works well with lamb imo, reduce if you don't like strong garlic flavor)
5 to 6 pounds medium to large juicy tomatoes, any variety, cored, peeled and coarsely chopped (If you don't have access to good quality fresh tomatoes, canned chopped tomatoes work in a pinch say 48oz of canned should do the trick)
1 tablespoon minced fresh thyme
1 tablespoon minced fresh rosemary
1/2 tablespoon fresh minced sage
1/4 cup parmesan reserved for final adjustments
2 bay leaves, fresh if possible
-- Kosher or sea salt and pepper, to taste
Saute the fresh garlic, shallots, and minced onion until it is well caramelized. Remove from heat. Add, along with all of the ingredients except the bay leaves and parmesan to a blender and blend well until sauce has reached desired consistency. Pour sauce into saucepan, add the bay leaves and heat on medium heat until sauce is bubbling and begins to thicken. If you wish, add the parmesan cheese directly to the sauce to further add some flavor and thicken it. If it is still too watery, you can add more cheese or carefully add more cornstarch to the sauce.
Now, here you have two options, you can add chopped chunks of gyro meat directly to the sauce, or if you want to make a lighter, less chunky "lamb pasta sauce" you can add the cooked meat directly to the sauce when you're blending it and the meat will be evenly dispersed throughout the sauce but it won't be nearly as chunky as if you add the meat later. Either way, it's up to you. I recommend serving this sauce paired with spaghetti or Penne.
Cream Sauces - I don't really recommend cream based sauces with lamb since it's so strong a flavor it's going to overpower pretty much anything you pair it with...I suppose you could fold it into a "vodka" sauce (tomato and cream sauce mixed) but I don't know for sure.
Lamb Calzone - This recipe is a bit involved, but you can definitely pair this gyro meat into a calzon with mozzerall, parmesan and some crumbled feta along with oregano/thyme/sage/peppers to make a really savory dish. I'm at work atm, so I don't know the dough recipe off the top of my head, but I can definitely take a stab at the filling, you can usually find pre-mixed pizza dough at stores nowadays, so you can just use that instead.
Gyro Calzone Filling
8 oz Gyro meat, roughly chopped
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon minced onion
1 tablespoon minced garlic
1/4 teaspoon minced fresh sage
1/2 teaspoon minced oregano
1/2 teaspoon minced parsley
1 egg beaten
1/2 cup chopped bell pepper any color
1/2 cup chopped fresh tomato
1/4 cup chopped sun dried tomatoes (optional)
3/4 cup mozzerella cheese
1/4 cup parmesan
1/4 cup feta cheese, crumbled
Olive oil for brushing
Combine all of the ingredients in a bowl and mix well. Prepare the dough. Now, I'm not sure what kind of size calzone you want to make. That filling right there should make two fairly large sized calzones to feed at least two people. However you choose to size the calzone, just use this simple rule:
Leave at least 1" between the end of the filling and the edge of the dough. Then simply fold the dough over the filling and pinch the ends shut. Place the Calzones on a baking tray and Brush the dough with the reserved olive oil and place in a pre-heated oven at 425 degrees F for about 20 minutes or until the tops of the calzones have risen completely and browned lightly.
Gyro and Rice with Yogurt Cucumber Salad - A very simple dish, I like to often eat strips of Gyro meat on a bed of really good quality aromatic rice, usually Basmati/Jasmine rice and pair it with a good salad. And frankly, there's no better salad to pair with pretty much any kind of grilled meat, than a nice cool yogurt cucumber salad. Seriously, this thing is the perfect accompaniment to anything spicy, grilled, roasted or braised. Give it a try!
Greatcow's Yogurt Cucumber Salad
6 Large Cucumbers, Peeled. Seeds scooped out and thrown away. Chopped into small cubes.
1 quart non-fat plain yogurt (unflavored, this is important!)
1 teaspoon ground pepper, or to taste
1-3 sprigs of fresh dill, minced
4-6 cloves fresh garlic, minced
Kosher Salt to taste and for the "curing" step
Take the chopped cucumber mixture, and place into a large enough bowl to work in. Add about 1/4 cup kosher salt and massage well into the cucumbers. Cover with plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes for up to 2 hours. What wer'e basically doing here is leeching the excess water from the cucumbers that'll make the salad a bit easier to digest. Once you remove the bowl from the refrigerator, drain the juice in the bowl and rinse the cucumbers well.
Add the unflavored non-fat yogurt to the cucumbers and mix well. Add the garlic, dill and pepper. Mix well.
At this point the salad is ready! Simply add salt or other seasonings of your choice to taste and either serve immediately, or place back into the fridge to chill until ready to serve. The salad should keep for about a day or so before the cucumbers start leeching more water into the yogurt so you'll probably want to eat it quick.
Chilis and Stews - Now that I think about it, given how well flavored Gyro meat already is, it would make a good basepoint for chili and stew, I figure just adjust the spices accordingly given the strength of the meat, I'd lay off the spices and salt just a bit to allow the Gyro meat to do most of the talking, but that'd just be my recommendation.
Hooboy! That was a mouthful! Hope you make good use of that Gyro tube! Good luck!
Wud yoo laek to lern aboot meatz? Look here!
That sounds AWESOME! Oh man I haven't had good shepards pie in YEARS. Strongly seasoned Gyro meat would be perfect for shepards pie.
Wud yoo laek to lern aboot meatz? Look here!
I may just have to make a hat out of this thing.
Hopefully you mean carving yourself a delicious tophat out of it.