How to cook shawarma in pita bread at home: ingredients, recipe with description, cooking features

2024 Author: Isabella Gilson | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:14

Despite the fact that street food and all kinds of fast foods are considered unhe althy, many people like such food. The only negative is that it is never 100% known what is inside, so not everyone dares to buy this kind of food at roadside catering outlets, despite their inner desire. It is for such sane people that this article will tell you how to cook shawarma at home in pita bread, and step-by-step photos of the recipe will help in the sequence of actions.

What is shawarma?

Shawarma, shuarma are all about the same dish, which is one of the most frequent on the menu of various fast food establishments. Usually it is meat fried on a spit, over an open fire, chopped into small pieces and wrapped in an unleavened cake along with sauce, herbs and various additives.

There is also a vegan version without meat, but with mushrooms, tofu, various vegetables. To cook shawarma at home in pita bread, as close as possiblereminiscent of the taste of the original, use lamb or pork, but it is easier and more economical to take chicken fillet or thighs. Poultry meat cooks faster, more dietary, which is also important for many.

How to make shawarma with chicken in pita bread at home: a step by step recipe with photos

The easiest recipe is based on these products:

• Armenian thin lavash – 1 piece;
• chicken fillet - 500 grams;
• Beijing cabbage - 120 grams;
• 1 pickled cucumber (can be pickled);
• 1 fresh tomato with fleshy flesh;
• mayonnaise and ketchup - 60 grams each;
• 2 tbsp. l. vegetable oil;
• 1/2 tsp s alt;
• 2 cloves of garlic;
• 1/4 tsp nutmeg and the same amount of black pepper;
• a few green onions.

Preparing the filling

Before you cook shawarma at home in pita bread, you need to cut chicken and fry it with spices. To do this, cut the fillet into small pieces, sprinkle with a mixture of s alt, crushed garlic and spices, leave for 10-15 minutes to reveal the aroma of spices.

Heat the oil in a frying pan and fry the chicken pieces in it until golden brown, stirring with a spatula, to give an even "tan". While the meat is cooking, chop the Chinese cabbage into thin strips, cut the cucumber in the same way, and the tomato into small slices. Some people add additional fresh cucumber, but this creates an unnecessary taste disharmony.

Meat filling options

To geta faster option, not loaded with roasted fillets, you can cook shawarma at home in pita bread with chicken the way eternally busy people do: buy a ready-made smoked chicken breast and just cut it into pieces. The taste will not be quite traditional, but why not?

You can also fry the whole meat fillet in a pan until cooked, and then cut it into small pieces. This version of preparing meat for the filling is considered the most dietary, so people who are concerned about being overweight will be attracted by just this option. Quickly cook shawarma in pita bread with chicken at home, as required by the classic recipe, that is, using grilled meat is hardly accessible to anyone, so you have to experiment, which often leads to very original flavor versions.

How to properly wrap a shawarma?

If this simple dish is being prepared for the first time, and there are no practical skills on how to make shawarma with chicken at home in pita bread, a recipe with a step-by-step description will come to the rescue:

1. Spread the Armenian lavash on the table. If it is large (side width more than 30 cm), then it is better to cut it into two parts. This will make it easier to roll it up, and the finished shawarma will look neater.
2. Smear the sauce made from mayonnaise and ketchup over the entire surface, they just need to be mixed together until a uniform consistency.
3. Leaving a free space from the edge about 3-5 centimeters wide, arrange vegetables on the pita bread in strips: cabbage, cucumbers and tomatoes. On top of themSpread the fried meat in an even layer. Sprinkle with finely chopped green onions.
4. Wrap the narrow edge of the lavash a little, then fold along the long edge on both sides and roll the whole layer into a tight roll, making sure that the filling lies evenly and does not tear the dough.

You also need to decide on the serving and decide how to cook shawarma at home in pita bread: just roll it up or fry it in a pan? In some countries, in street catering, it is lightly grilled to give the product a crispy taste. It is worth recalling that only fresh pita bread, baked on the day of preparation, is used to prepare shawarma, otherwise, when rolling it into a roll, the dried dough may break and the filling will fall out. It is for this reason that chefs around the world prefer to prepare this dish with pita (a variation of Mexican bread) or chapatis (Indian bread), which are less demanding in terms of preparation time.

With cheese

How else to cook shawarma at home in pita bread with chicken? A step-by-step recipe (with photo) will tell you how to make this dish more satisfying, which is important for people with great physical exertion.

This shawarma can be taken with you to work as lunch (heated later in the microwave) or on a picnic, where everything is often eaten without a trace. For two servings, the recipe calls for the following ingredients:

• 1 thin lavash;
• 350 grams chicken fillet;
• 1 red onion;
• 120grams of hard cheese;
• 100 ml of kefir or yogurt without sugar and additives;
• 1 pc. fresh cucumber and tomato;
• 50 grams each of ketchup and mayonnaise;
• 1/2 tsp hops-suneli;
• black pepper and s alt to taste.

Cooking

This method allows you to cook delicious shawarma at home in pita bread. It differs in that it contains cheese, which is usually not put in a shawarma, as well as an original marinade for meat, which makes it especially tender. Mix kefir, suneli hops and s alt, add black pepper if desired. Cut the meat into small thin pieces and soak in kefir for half an hour along with finely chopped onions. In the meantime, cut the cucumber and tomato into thin semicircles, grate the cheese on a coarse grater, and combine the mayonnaise with ketchup in one bowl, turning it into a spicy sauce. Some people add mustard, but according to Turkish chefs (Turkey is the birthplace of shawarma), it is superfluous in this dish.

When the meat is marinated, squeeze out excess liquid with your hands (you can dry the pieces with a paper towel) and fry it in 1 tbsp. l. vegetable oil to a rich color. Spread a sheet of Armenian lavash on the table, grease with the mayonnaise and ketchup sauce prepared earlier, put the vegetables in a layer closer to one edge, place the fried meat on them, sprinkle liberally with cheese and roll using the usual method. Next, place the shawarma on a baking sheet and put in the oven for 8-10 minutes, using a temperature setting of 230 degrees.

Vegan Shawarma (Meat Free)

Despite the fact that the traditional version of the dish with meat is very popular, clever adherents of the vegan movement have invented their own recipe that does not contain this product. As an alternative to meat, they use Adyghe cheese or tofu, mixing it with certain spices. A set of products for two pita breads 30-35 cm in size:

• 200 grams of Adyghe cheese;
• 120 grams Chinese cabbage;
• 100 grams each of vegan mayonnaise and ketchup;
• 1 pc. fresh tomato and cucumber;
• a generous pinch of curry (spicy);
• s alt to taste;
• a little ground coriander or black pepper.

Usually spices are used to taste, as their presence is optional. That is why some recipes do not have a strict dosage of them.

Step by step cooking

Before you cook shawarma at home in pita bread, you need to make a sauce for it by mixing mayonnaise, ketchup, all spices and s alt in one bowl. It is worth remembering that excessive passion for aromatic herbs will kill the natural taste of vegetables, but without them the dish will be too bland. Cut the cucumber and tomato into long but thin strips, chop the cabbage in the same way. In a frying pan, heat one tablespoon of vegetable oil and fry the cheese mashed into small pieces in it for a couple of minutes.

Next, start forming the shawarma: divide the sauce into two parts and spread it on the surface of the pita bread, evenly spread on the table. Stepping back a little from the edge, immediately lay out the sliced \u200b\u200bcucumbers, then the tomato, and cabbage on it. On top of vegetablesput the cheese and roll the pita roll, following the instructions described above.

Additional topping ideas

For those who don't like the classic chicken shawarma, here are a few more options:

1. Instead of the usual set of vegetables, use a mixture of spinach, arugula, green lettuce and onion, which are laid out in a layer on pita bread, covered with fried meat and sprinkled with light sesame seeds mixed with your favorite spice. Drizzle with the rest of the sauce and wrap in an envelope.
2. Another version of how to cook shawarma at home in pita bread with step-by-step actions: bake the meat for the filling in a whole piece in the oven, pre-coated with a mixture of mayonnaise and garlic. Fry the mushrooms in a pan in a small amount of oil, you can add onions. Use these ingredients for the filling by adding pickled cucumber julienne, Korean carrots and some fresh parsley for a contrasting color.

Even if you cook shawarma without any meat, mushrooms, cheese and other "heavy" products - only with vegetables, the dish turns out to be tasty and satisfying, but very low in calories. It can even be classified as dietary, since lavash is yeast-free bread, and vegetables themselves have a very low energy value.