🇬🇷 Greece · Family: Kebab & Lahmacun · Heat: Grilled · Bread: pita · Proteins: pork
Ingredients
Kebab se Pita is the ground-meat skewer wrapped into bread, se pita meaning "in pita": a spiced minced-meat kebab pulled off its skewer and rolled into a soft round with the usual street-counter dressing. The angle is that this is the handheld, walk-and-eat form of the kebab, so the whole thing has to survive being held in one hand without shedding its contents, which puts as much weight on the wrap and the fold as on the meat.
The build is the familiar souvlaki sequence. The pita, a soft thick round rather than pocket bread, is warmed flat on the griddle until it is pliable and faintly blistered but never crisp. Tzatziki usually goes down first as a moisture barrier, then the hot kebab slid off the skewer and laid along the length, then sliced tomato, raw onion, and a handful of fried patates run down the bread rather than bunched at one end. The cook rolls it into a cone and papers it immediately to set the shape. Good execution warms the pita enough to fold without cracking, distributes the kebab along the whole roll so the last bite still has meat, and keeps the sauce as a thin barrier rather than a flood. Sloppy work uses a cold or dry pita that splits at the first bend, front-loads the meat and leaves a tail of empty oily bread, or drowns the wrap in tzatziki until the base collapses before it is half eaten.
How it shifts is mostly load and which meat goes in. The kebab can be the standard spiced mince or a beef version, and the beef kebab is its own preparation that deserves its own article rather than being crowded in here. Some counters griddle the pita in the spit fat for a richer bread; others keep it plain so the tzatziki leads. The same kebab served open on a plate as a merida is a separate eating experience and a separate build. What the wrapped form reliably promises is the kebab as honest street food, where a careful fold and a warm pliable bread are the difference between a tight package and a bag of greased crumbs.
More from this family
Other Kebab & Lahmacun sandwiches in Greece:
