Gyros Hirino (Γύρος Χοιρινό) is pork gyros, the version most Greeks mean when they say gyros without qualifying it. The meat is the whole argument: pork shoulder or leg, sliced into broad flat pieces, seasoned and stacked on a vertical spit so that fat is layered deliberately between the lean. That fat is not an accident. As the cone turns against the heating element, the rendering fat bastes everything below it, which is how a tall stack of pork stays moist instead of drying into shavings. The seasoning leans on oregano, thyme, garlic, paprika, and cumin, a profile that reads warm and herbal rather than sharp.
Build starts at the spit. The cook shaves the outer face in long downward strokes once it has crisped, taking thin curls with browned edges and softer interior. Good hirino shows two textures in the same bite, a lacquered exterior and a juicy centre, because the cook only cuts what has actually caramelised and lets the next layer keep turning. Sloppy hirino is cut too deep or too early, so the shavings are uniformly pale, steamed rather than seared, and they pool grease without any crust to carry the spice. The stack should be packed tightly enough that slices hold their shape; a loose cone throws ragged shreds that go limp before they reach the bread.
The pork is the constant, but how it is served is where this dish branches. Folded into pita with tomato, onion, tzatziki, and a handful of fried patates, it becomes the wrapped street format eaten on foot. Plated as a merida, the same shavings arrive with the garnishes alongside rather than rolled in, eaten with a fork. The seasoning blend itself, the herbal-and-cumin base, is a subject worth its own treatment and deserves its own article rather than being crowded in here. What stays true across every version is the spit logic: fat between lean, patience before the knife, and shavings cut only when they have earned a crust. Chicken gyros runs a parallel track with leaner meat and a lighter spice hand, and that contrast deserves its own article rather than being crowded in here.