Greek Souvlaki

I know that those of you who are in Greece right now or have been in Greece at some point, have tasted the famous greek souvlaki. Even during my erasmus people kept mentioning it once they found out I was Greek. Today, I will write down a very simple recipee, so that you can try making your own homemade souvlaki.

Ingredients:

• You can buy pork that has already been chopped and put into sticks (kalamakia) or just buy some pork leg and cut it on your own -it's the same thing.

• Pita breads for souvlaki. You can find that in any supermarket. There are fresh and frozen ones. The fresh ones are better, because even if you decide that you're going to use half of them or so, you can freeze the other half on your own.

• Butter (optional)

• olive-oil

• vinegar

• Tomatoes

• Onions (optional)

• Tzatziki or any other sauce (mayonnaise, mustard etc.)

• Fried potatoes (optional)

• salt

• pepper

• oregano

• paprika (optional)

You have probably noticed that I haven't writed any quantities used. This is because you get to decide how many pieces of souvlaki you will make and for how many people. Depending on that, you will decide on the number of the rest of the ingredients.

You will start with the meat. Cut it in very small pieces (or, if it's already cut, remove it from the stick) and wash it well. Then squeeze the water out of it and put some vinegar on it -just some drops. Then, put the meat in a baking pan and in the oven's grill in 180oC. You leave the meat in the oven for 15 minutes and then you take it out. You will notice that there are the meat's liquids in the baking pan. Empty the baking pan so that no liquids remain. Add salt, pepper and olive-oil to the meat and put it back in the oven. You will have to open the oven once or twice more, to stir the meat.

When the meat is almost ready, it's time to prepare the pita breads. You can fry them in a non-stick pan using a little butter or olive-oil. Put the frying pan in a medium temperature and each pita bread separately. Make sure to turn them around frequently, or they'll burn.

An alternative solution is to bake the pitas in the oven's grill. However, this is a bit risky, because they can easily get burned or stop being as soft as they should.

After the pitas are ready, we put them in a plate and fill them with meat, pieces of tomato and onion, fried potatoes (the recipee is like that, but if you don't like it that way, you can skip the potatoes or serve them on the side) and tzatziki or any other sauce. Then, close the pita and wrap it in a graseproof paper. Enjoy!

• An alternative solution for those who don't like pork is do the same recipee, replacing it with chicken. Take some chicken, cut it in pieces and put it in a pot with a bit of olive oil. Once it's ready serve it in a pita bread with lettuce, tomato and a special sauce which consists of 2 parts of mayonnaise and 1 part of mustard.

• The traditional souvlaki that has pork in it, is usually better to serve with tzatziki. Since here I have given a recipee for homemade souvlaki, why not do the same with the tzatziki that will go with it? So, there you have the traditional tzatziki recipee:

Ingredients for the tzatziki:

• 2 trays of yoghurt

• 4 cloves of garlic

• 1 pinch of salt

• 1 spoonful of chopped dill

• 2 spoonfuls of vinegar

• 5 spoonfuls olive oil

• 1 cucumber grated and drained

Take a bowl and add the yoghurt, the garlic cloves, the vinegar, the dill and the cucumber, that has already been grated and drained. Then, add the olive-oil and salt. Stir very well, until all the ingredients are mixed. Put the tzatziki in the fridge and, 4-5 hours later, you can eat it.