When Did Gyros Become Ground Meat?

[Phubar]

Most of the time pork(butts) are used for gyros in many parts of the world cause lamb is too expensive...maybe in Australia/New Zealand the lamb is much cheaper.
In Greece they also use pork most of the time.

[buccaneer]

Lamb is 4 or 6 times the price of pork here.

[Phubar]

Thought maybe it was much cheaper over there cause lots of lamb comes from New Zealand.

[Pole D]

Originally Posted by rcbaughn

I've always had gyros made from ground loafs that spin on a hot vertical rotisserie. I didn't know that whole meat cuts would be considered a gyro at all. All those spices mixed into the lamb loaf is what makes it a gyro to me, and it all holds together just as if it is one piece of meat and not ground.

By the way, are french fries REALLY a traditional addition to a gyro? I've never ever ever seen them used as a filling or topping. Always served on the side if they come with the order. Seems strange to me that it's a "traditional" topping in Greece. Seems like an American hamburger throwback if anything.

Traditional...well...I'm not sure if I would go that far but there are many places in Greece that do put fries in a gyro or souvlaki.

[buccaneer]

Originally Posted by Phubar

Thought maybe it was much cheaper over there cause lots of lamb comes from New Zealand.

Yeah I don't think it is supply and demand fixing prices, more like marketing and boards of "lamb Australia" forcing prices to get a fix point.

[HeSmellsLikeSmoke]

Originally Posted by buccaneer

Interestingly, Gyros tested 400% higher in both occurrence and rate of food contamination of all take out foods, by food scientist downunder.
Usually the main consumer is Aussies pissed out of their skulls so the beer gets blamed

This has me thinking. You put a large cone of uncooked ground meat out beside a radiant panel and rotate it. How is it possible that a large portion of the meat isn't in the temperature danger zone pretty much all the time? If you have little or sporadic customer flow you get different temps than when you are shaving and serving constantly.

It seems to be an inherently dodgey system as far as food safety.

[Gore]

I do want to comment that in Turkey, they will generally ladle one or two large spoonfuls of the drippings at the bottom of the spit onto the sandwich. As you can imagine, this is about 99% grease. I always tell them not to put any on mine. They usually look at me in astonishment and tell me that is the best part. When I was younger, my stomach could handle such things.

[billm]

[QUOTE=HeSmellsLikeSmoke;2417111]I went back to the Greek restaurant today to check out just how they make their Gyros.

They buy a cone of ground beef and lamb. The manager said he believes it is made in Chicago. It looked pre-cooked to me, but I didn't ask. The vertical radiant heater looked more like a warmer than a cooker due to it's relatively small size. I thought the resulting product was pretty good, but not superior in any respect.

Here is a picture of their setup.

[/QUOTEthe
the two gyros meat suppliers in Chicago are Kronos and Grecian Delight. Its rare for place to actually make their own cones..the exception to this in Chicago area is Nicks in Niles and Parthenon restaurant. I believe Central Gyros makes their own as well. How the cones are made is beyond me but a lot of the ones making them in house are using a method similar to al pastor as Dann mentioned..thinly sliced meat stacked on top of each other on a skewer and cooked vertically on the vertical cooker.

[Wesman61]

I thought I could settle this by asking my daughter's Greek friend. Her answer:
"It has to do with the stuff on the cone which i would say is a bit of both.
It depends on the meat and where you get it too."
Sorry I couldn't help LOL.