CDKitchen - it's what's cooking online!Search for recipes here!

Oh, My Gyro!

posted January 15, 2008
  by Sarah Christine Bolton, The Savvy Slow Cooker

For one of our first dates, my boyfriend brought Greek food from a nearby restaurant to the campus where we were both going to college. We met under the trees, at a stone picnic table. He opened the brown paper bag and pulled out two salads (“I didn’t order myself a salad,” he said, confused). I searched for forks and napkins; there were none. We ate gyro salads with our fingers. He was flustered and embarrassed. I thought it was funny and adorable that he wanted to impress me so much. It must have worked; I married him.

The history of gyros is not easily traced. The main ingredients that make up a gyro (lamb, flat bread, grilled vegetables and seasonings) were a part of the diet of ancient people living in the Middle East. But when all those ingredients came together in the marriage that is gyro is hard to say. In fact, gyros are not found in classic Greek cookery or even listed in Greek cookbooks.

The main difference between gyros and their popular cousin, shish kebabs, is that gyro meat (traditionally a mixture of ground lamb and beef) is seasoned with paprika, lemon, and garlic and cooked on a skewer rotating over a heat source (Some sources claim that this practice dates back to the time of Alexander, when his troops would cook chunks of meat on their swords. Let’s just hope they sanitized those things after battle). Thin slices of the meat are cut off and rolled up into pita bread with sauce and garnishes. My personal favorites are tomatoes and black Greek olives.

Olives have always been one of my favorite things about Greek food. When I was a kid, I used to take a can of black olives and stick them, one-by-one, onto all ten fingers. Slowly, I would eat them, savoring the silky and salty flavor.

Even now, I can easily go through half a can on my own. Two summers ago, a college friend and I drove across the country-from Idaho back to Mississippi, where we were both enrolled. During the trip, I was so concerned about having to pay for tuition that I was determined to exist for a week on a box of canned food. Besides the collard greens, beets, and refried beans, I also had several cans of black olives. While the miles of black asphalt passed underneath us, we listened to a mix CD and popped olives into our mouths.

So it is that the gyros we might order in a Greek restaurant are a fairly modern invention. Most food historians would agree that both the name and the product originated relatively recently in New York City. They were marketed as a fast food, and were no doubt convenient to busy New Yorkers, who could hold a gyro in one hand and go.

The word gyro (pronounced “year-oh”) supposedly first appeared in print in 1970, and means a “turn” in Greek. Some food historians speculate that the word has more to do with the Italian-American “Hero” sandwich than anything Greek.


My Gyro Recipe
http://www.cdkitchen.com/


Serves/Makes: 4
Ready in: 2-5 hrs

* 1/2 pound ground lamb
* 1/2 pound ground turkey
* 1/2 onion, chopped finely
* 3 cloves garlic, minced
* 1/2 lemon, juiced
* 2 teaspoons oregano
* 1 teaspoon paprika
* Salt to taste

***Tzatziki sauce***

* 1 small cucumbers
* 1 cup plain yogurt
* 2 tablespoons olive oil
* 4 cloves garlic minced
* 2 tablespoons mint
* 1 lemon, juiced
* Salt to taste

***Extras***

* lettuce
* chopped tomato
* olives
* feta cheese
* Pita bread

Place onions and garlic into crockpot. Mix lamb, turkey, oregano and salt together; place on top of onions. Pour lemon juice over the top. Cover and cook on LOW for 3-4 hours.

Serve meat thinly sliced and wrapped in a warmed pita with lettuce, chopped tomato, olives, feta cheese, and Tzatziki sauce.

Tzatziki sauce: Combine yogurt, olive oil, and lemon juice in a bowl. Cover and refrigerate for one hour. In a food processor, blend cucumbers, garlic, and mint. Slowly add yogurt mixture and salt and blend just until mixed.

Return to refrigerator until ready to use.

©2009 CDKitchen, Inc. No reproduction or distribution of this article is allowed without express permission from CDKitchen, Inc.
To share this article with others, you may link to this page:
http://cooking.cdkitchen.com/TheSavvySlowCooker/632.html



printer-friendly version

Visitor Comments

RE: OH MY GYRO !!!!!!!!!! comment by Buck Raye at 2008-01-31 13:01:41
Sarah, Tried out the Gyro recipe w /Tzatziki sauce. I will never go to a "takeaway" again. This is so good and you are to be commended for making it available. Best of luck in your culinary endeavours!!!! Have a pleasant day, Buck


RE: gyro comment by patty at 2008-07-23 22:13:55
I find it interesting that all those countries over near Greece (Turkey, Iraq, Syria, Jordan, even India ) They all have a version of the Gyro. They are all called something else... Turkey has what they call Kabobs and so does Iraq...both generally have the exact same things as the Gyro (lamb/beef combo, onions, tomato and some sort of creamy sauce) but on slightly different bread....I've even had a Doner from Bosnia -- It's INCREDIBLE and the bread is out of this world....Guess it's like all over the US we have changed the burger...


RE: my gyro recipe comment by jw at 2008-09-03 20:37:56
this recipe reads sooooo GOOD.. Thanks a mill for sharing, it is going to be a dynamite autum having the opportunity to add this to my list of slow cooker plans. THANK YOU.


Comment on this article:

Name or Nickname (required):
Subject:
Your comment about this article:

Note: your comment will appear publicly


author bio

Sarah Christine Bolton
CDKitchen Cooking Columnist Sarah Christine Bolton
Specialty: Slow Cooker/Crockpot Cuisine
Lives: Memphis, TN
Weekly Column: The Savvy Slow Cooker
::read full bio::

new article comments

selected rice in the stuffed peppers
selected too much clove
selected ok
selected good recipes
selected Rice?
selected battery/crockpot
selected sounds good
selected Stuffed Peppers
selected Thank you, Chef Costello!
selected Pre-heating slow cookers
Advertisement
ADVERTISE WITH US