GYROS - It's not all Greek to me.

A couple of months ago we travelled down to Baltimore to see the Yankees play at Camden Yards.  We found a hotel through hotwire where you get great rates but don't get to pick out the hotel - you pick the area of the city you want to go to and how many stars and have to pay up front to get the awesome rate which is much lower than any advertised rate.  To make sure I didn't end up in a 'bring your own sheets' motel, I checked out the reviews of the place we were going to stay at several months in advance.  There were a lot of mixed reviews, some good, some bad - but since most people don't bother to write a review unless they really hated the place, I figured we'd be fine, which we were.  One of the reviews said that the hotel restaurant wasn't any good and mentioned a food truck around the corner which had great gyros, and really cheap ones too - only about $4 each.  I hadn't had a Gyro in years, I think I only tried one once when I was a teenager and was turned off by the white mayo like sauce.  I'm 38 now and tastes change and I figured if I didn't like it, it was only $4 and I'm sure my wife would love it so I could always give it to her.  I had recently discovered real Indian cuisine thanks to my wife's co-workers and love it immensely.  Needless to say I am now in love with Gyro's.  They easily cracked my top ten favorite foods list... Number 3 with a bullet behind only Sushi and Guacamole Burgers.  The perfect combination of lamb, spices, fresh tomatoes and lettuce, red onions, tangy cucumber yogurt sauce and a little hot sauce in mine to boot makes my mouth water just thinking about it.  My mom got a chicken salad and my dad got a couple of dirty water dogs which he wasn't impressed with - hey, you can't beat NY for those so everywhere else is a step down at best, right?  The next day we stopped there again and all got Gyros - Mom got a chicken one.  For those of you who have never been to Camden Yards, YES you can bring food in (and unopened plastic soda bottles).  If you don't have season tickets, don't get there 2 hours before game time hoping to catch batting practice, they won't let you into the stadium part until an hour and a half before first pitch - a little off topic, but I don't want to forget to mention.

We got back to NY and the next night I was craving a gyro BIG TIME!   We went out to a local Greek place with a restaurant.com $25 gift certificate which I bought THAT DAY and was told when we got there that they no longer accept them... ok... "bye".   I pulled out my iphone and found another place close by.  We went there and ordered Gyros which were good, but not as tasty as the ones in Baltimore and they also had more salad than meat and were a little pricey.  It turns out the place was not Greek, but a Turkish restaurant that has gyros on the menu.  We loved the ambiance and went back again, and their hummus was awesome, and we will go back again but next time I'm going to try something else like one of the Turkish dishes.  I found a REALLY, REALLY good gyro place close to work  on Sunrise Highway in Merrick called Gyro Palace  but it’s too far to travel to from home (about 45 minutes each way) and too far to go to for my 30 minute lunch break which I prefer to spend getting my exercise points in walking up and down Freeport’s Nautical Mile.   Gyro Palace had a great after 4PM special - 4 gyros plus a large Greek salad for only $30 plus tax.  Not nearly as good as the food truck in Baltimore price, but very good for a place on Long Island paying New York rent.   It works out pretty good for me as I get out of work at 3:30 and get there around 3:50 and they let me order it even though it’s not exactly 4PM yet.  The only drawback is that I get to  smell the food the entire way home and it drives me crazy -  by the time I get home I'm like a rapid dog and I wolf it down too fast to fully savor and enjoy it.   I've gone there 4 times already in the past 30 days.  My Gyro craving is starting to hit home though now because Gyro Palace is too far a trek for me on the weekends and Baltimore is much, much too far.

I looked up online to find gyro recipes and learned a lot.  For one, I thought that big hunk of meat that you see on all around the world  on 'Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations'  that they keep cutting from was a big leg of lamb or beef or pork with a bone in the middle... it's not.  It's a long sword like skewer with stack upon stack of boneless slices of meat stacked on top of each other.  The skewer turns like a vertical rotisserie oven in front of a flame and cooks the outside which is sliced off to make each sandwich, gyro, taco,  whatever all day long.  A hunk of fat is placed at the top which drips down on the sides of the meat and cooks to a nice crisp crust.  How ingenious!   I found a few spice mixtures and cooking techniques for the gyro meat and the Tzatziki Sauce that I combined and improved on to make them tastier and healthier.  I’ve now got a HUGE chicken gyro at under 10 points - not bad at all considering a Big Mac is 13.  I think I might be able to scale it down even more.

GYRO MEAT:
Get I pork loin with the fat trimmed off or a package of  boneless skinless white meat chicken breast.
 Chill the meat in the freezer for 15 to 30 minutes.  This will firm it up and make it a lot easier and safer to slice very thin.  Sharpen your knife and slice the chicken or pork as thin as you can - about 1/8 to 1/4” thick.  I slice each chicken breast into 4 slices.    Spinkle both sides of each slice of meat very liberally with a spice mixture of PAPRIKA, OREGANO, SEA SALT, BLACK PEPPER, CUMIN and GARLIC POWDER.  Stack the seasoned slices on top of each other with a teaspoon of vinegar on top of each layer.  Place in the refrigerator to marinate for 30 minutes to 2 hours.  Don’t leave it marinating too long as the acidity of the vinegar will cook and toughen the meat.  While it’s marinating you can make the  Tzatziki  Sauce.  When it’s done marinating, heat a teflon non stick pan on high heat.  Place the meat directly onto the hot pan without any oil.  Cook about 45 seconds to a minute on each side.

GYRO SAUCE (Tzatziki Sauce)
Peel and remove the seeds from ONE LARGE CUCUMBER  Chop finely and place into a food processor.  Add one 8 oz container of FAT FREE GREEK YOGURT, one teaspoon of SEA SALT, 1 tablespoon of FRESH DILL (or 2 tablespoons of DRY DILL), WHITE PEPPER, 1/4 cup of LOW FAT SOUR CREAM, 2 cloves CHOPPED GARLIC and 1 tablespoon of fresh LEMON JUICE.  Mix thoroughly and refrigerate for 30 minutes.   This will make more than enough for 4 Gyros.  Each serving is only 1 point.  I also like to mix some SRIRACHA HOT CHILI SAUCE  in mine as well.

PITA
Here's a trick I learned that my wife uses with day old rice - it works well with bread, shumai, rice, anything that you want to heat and soften up a little in the microwave.  Place one WHOLE WHEAT PITA BREAD onto a plate with a damp paper towel on top and microwave for 15 seconds, flip over and microwave for another 15 seconds.  The Whole wheat pitas I found were only 4 points each.

VEGGIES
1 large diced TOMATO, a few slices of coarsely chopped ROMAINE LETTUCE, a few thin slices of RED ONION.

Place 5 oz of chicken or pork onto the whole wheat pita,  top with lettuce, tomatoes, onion and tzatziki  sauce.