Hello All! It's time for another recipe! Tonight we will be doing Shawarma, which is a traditional Lebanese meat recipe which become even more famous due to the movie The Avengers.
Iron Man: Alright. Hey. Alright. Good job, guys. Let's just not come in tomorrow. Let's just take a day. Have you ever tried Shawarma? There's a Shawarma joint about two blocks from here. I don't know what it is, but I wanna try it.
Thor: W'ere not finished yet.
Iron Man: And then Shawarma after.
Haha, I loved that part! Anyway, to the recipe we go.
Now my issue with this recipe is my aunt taught it to me, and the bad thing about learning from her and my mom is it’s a lot by instinct. No measurements, nothing. So I will post the recipe from Mama’s Lebanese Kitchen and then tell you what I did differently.
Mama’s Recipe:
Ingredients:- 2 lbs of fatty beef cuts (roast cut/steak cuts/butter steak…)
- 5 cloves of garlic
- ½ cup of freshly squeezed lemon juice
- ¼ cup of apple cider vinegar
- ¼ cup of olive oil
- 1 teaspoon cloves
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon cumin
- ½ teaspoon caraway (ground fennel)
- ½ teaspoon cardamon
- ½ teaspoon of oregano or thyme
- ½ teaspoon cinnamon
- ½ teaspoon nutmeg
- ½ teaspoon crushed peppercorn
- ¼ teaspoon of cayenne pepper
- ¼ teaspoon ground ginger
Shawarma Marinade
1. Mix the spices along with the lemon juice and apple cider vinegar in a blender for a couple of minutes. Don’t mix in the olive oil yet.
2. Cut the beef into chunks of 4 inches long by no more than ⅔ inch in thickness.
3. In a bowl, rub the meat with the marinade, sprinkle a bit of olive oil then rub again, cover and let marinate overnight in the fridge.
Grilling Shawarma: Oven Roasting
1. Lay the shawarma chunks in a Pyrex tray with a bit of marinade, cover the trap tightly with aluminum foil, then gently bake at 270-300F for 2 hours.
2. Once cooked, shred the meat on a cutting board and serve hot. This roasting method will make the meat very tender and juicy and will almost fall apart.
My Recipe:
Ingredients:
- 3 pounds rib-eye
- 10 pearl onions
- 1 package cherry tomatoes
- Abido Spices – Shawarma (Allspice, Black Pepper, Cinnamon, Ginger, Citric Acid, Cloves, Cardamun, Sumac)
- Cumin
- Olive Oil
For my recipe, I used rib-eye. I did this because rib-eye can be a little fatty, and since I wanted to use less oil, the fat will help keep the flavor. I used two packages, about 3 pounds, of meat.
Cooking Instructions:
1. Cut up the meat as thin as possible, keeping
them around 2-3 inches long
2. Place in aluminum baking pan
3. Add Abido Spices and cumin to meat and mix. Add
cherry tomatoes, peeled pearl onions and place whole into the pan with meat and
enough olive oil to mix meat and have it all covered (lightly) and a bit on the
bottom.
4. Preheat oven to 450. While oven is preheating,
let the meat sit out so it can marinate with the spices and oil.
5. Once oven is preheated, place pan in the oven
for about 15 minutes
6. After 15 minutes, take out and mix then place it back in the oven for
another 15 minutes
After the meat is finished, you can serve it with either
- Homemade french fries
- Pita bread
- Rice
- 2 teaspoons of Tahini paste
- 1 cup of freshly squeezed Lemon Juice
- 3 gloves of garlic, crushed
- A dash of Salt
1. In a small bowl, whisk the the Tahini paste, crushed garlic, lemon juice and salt until you turn the paste into a sauce.
- Brown vermicelli (as much or as little as you like, but don’t use TOO much) in vegetable oil
- Once browned, I cooked one cup rice per normal cooking instructions
Here is my final product:
I’m really happy how it all turned out! Next time, I will have my aunt be more specific with measurements. Also, the next time I will try cooking the shawarma a little differently, as there are many different ways to cook it. I hope you all like it! Talk to you all soon.
