A doner kebab is a popular take-away food consisting of thin slices cut from a cylindrical block of minced and seasoned meat (beef, lamb or chicken) grilled on a vertical, rotating spit and eaten on unleavened bread with fresh salad and sauce. It is not a shish-kebab!
The traditional doner kebab meat is lamb. Today, chicken, veal, turkey, and beef are cooked in the same manner, with a combination of veal leg meat, lamb meat, and lamb tail fat being a combination in Turkey. (Fatty cuts keep the meat moist and flavorful as it cooks on the rotisserie.)
The real stuff is made from 20 or so pounds of hand-sliced, hand-layered halal chicken, lamb or beef — which is then slowly cooked while rotating around a heat lamp. Sadly, places serving up this true delight are few and far between and are rarely found on the street.
"As a meal it brings together lean meat, wholemeal pitta bread, and it brings in vegetables in the form of salad. But doner kebabs tend to come smothered in dressings, which bring in a lot of fat and salt." Last year food scientists for Hampshire county council found that doner kebabs were the fattiest takeaways.
A typical kebab consists of bread stuffed with döner meat shavings, lettuce, sliced tomato and onions, with a choice of sauce including sauce blanche, a mayo-yogurt sauce. Kebabs are usually served with french fries, often stuffed into the bread itself.
Including it being made from surplus lamb off-cuts, offal, feet, ears, tongues and other unusual parts not found at a high street butcher shop or supermarket. When the manufacturers make the kebab meat, it is heavily spiced, processed and re-formed into a cylinder shape.
Doner Kebab is not supposed to have bones inside it.
Generally, people consider doner kebab meat unhealthy because it is high in calories. But they are a healthier fast-food option because they aren't deeply fried, unlike other street food varieties.
In the battle to be the best, the trusty late-night kebab wins as it can be packed with more vegetables, Small says. In an attempt to make a pizza healthier, he would cut down on the bread, meat and sugary sauces – leaving a pile of semi-fresh vegetables and cheese.
Doner kebabs were never likely to be cornerstones of a calorie-controlled diet, but just reading the contents in samples of the Turkish dish that became a staple of British takeaways may be enough to give you a heart attack.
The beautiful, roasted, slightly charred and flavorful stacks of meat are the heart and soul of doner kebabs. Meat that's past its prime or has stayed too long in the freezer lose their ability to soak up all the rich marinade flavors sd well as their ability for tenderness and juiciness.
Doner Kebab Meat recipe – beef or lamb
This homemade version of rotisserie Doner Kebab Meat can be made with either lamb or beef. While beef is a firm favourite here in Australia, in Turkey (the home of Doner Kebabs) they are made with both lamb and beef.
Our Berlin Döner is made with lean cuts of beef and turkey breast to keep the meat juicy and moist and our chicken shawarma is gluten free, free range chicken thigh. Our kebabs contain up to 85% lean meat.
The origins of the döner kebab go back centuries. As any Turkish-speaking person could tell you, the name “döner kebab” is derived from the Turkish words dönmek (to turn or rotate) and kebap (roasted meat), giving the literal meaning “rotating roast”.
Döner kebabs are a type of Turkish dish similar to the Greek gyro or the Arab shawarma made with seasoned meat shaved from a vertical rotisserie, a style of cooking that dates back to the Ottomans.
Thai cuisine often tops the list of healthy takeaways. Unlike Chinese food, which is often high in sugar and salt, Thai cooking uses fresh herbs and spices to add flavour, while also maintaining a focus on fresh vegetables and good quality meat - meaning dishes are generally lower in calories and fat.
The better quality kebabs use New Zealand lamb shoulder steak, which has around 10-15% fat. Kebabs made with minced lamb usually have a higher fat content, closer to 20-25% fat. Chicken kebabs use thighs and breast with the skin on.
The ubiquitous Turkish food is doner kebab. Depending on where you live, you may know it as gyro (Greek, made mostly with pork), tacos del pastor (brought to Latin America by Lebanese immigrants), shawarma in Arabic, Kebab Torki (in Persian) or simply as doner in Turkey.
Other sizes: 1 serving - 620kcal, 100 g - 159kcal, 1 oz - 45kcal, more...
The main difference between döner and gyros has to do with the meat. Döner meat is made from lamb or pork, while gyros meat is usually made from lamb or chicken. The meat isn't the only difference, though. How the meat is prepared is also different!
The study tested for the presence of DNA from bovine, pig, sheep, goat, horse, chicken and turkey in ten kebabs and ten lamb dishes. Horse, goat, pig or turkey DNA was not found in any sample.
They eat lamb a lot in the southern parts of Europe and Northern Africa. Doner Kebab is a well-known dish. We are going to make Doner Kebab from a leg of lamb. And then medium rare like a leg of lamb should be eaten.
Food watchdogs found just one lamb kebab out of 13 was 100% lamb. Tests by trading standards officers showed 10 contained chicken, one had beef and one was a chicken and beef mixture.