Kokoretsi (Κοκορέτσι) is grilled lamb offal: seasoned organ meats, typically liver, kidney, and heart, bound by a winding of cleaned intestine and roasted on a spit over coals, then chopped and most often served in bread. It is a traditional Easter food in Greece and one of the defining things to come off a Greek charcoal spit. The angle is that this is offal cookery at its most exposed, where the whole dish lives or dies on cleaning and fire control with nothing downstream to rescue a mistake.
The make is a construction job before it is a cooking job. The organ pieces are cut, seasoned, and threaded onto a long spit; lengths of small intestine are then cleaned thoroughly and wound tightly around the whole bundle in an even spiral so it holds together and bastes itself as it turns. It cooks slowly over coals for a long time, the wound casing crisping and lacquering while the organs inside render and soften. Good execution is recognizable: scrupulous cleaning so there is no acrid or barnyard off-note, a casing that goes deep brown and crackling, interior that is tender and well seasoned with the fat properly rendered out. The failures are unforgiving. Inadequate cleaning is the cardinal sin and cannot be cooked away. Too hot a fire chars the wrap while leaving the inner organs underdone and rubbery; too long without enough fat and the whole spit dries to leather. When it is served, the kokoretsi is chopped fine on a board, often hit with oregano, lemon, and salt, and piled into bread while still hot.
How it shifts is regional and seasonal. It is strongly tied to the Easter spit alongside whole roast lamb, though many psistaria grill it year-round. Seasoning varies from a plain salt-and-oregano hand to versions carrying more spice; the tightness and thickness of the intestine wrap is a regional tell. Its close relatives, the spit-roasted kontosouvli and the bundled offal preparation gardoumba, are their own builds and each deserves its own article rather than being crowded in here. The standard never moves: meticulous cleaning, slow patient fire, and proper rendering, because the dish is only ever as honest as those three steps.