Kalofagas - Greek Food & Beyond » BBQ

Pork Butt Gyro

Peter Minakis — Mon, 26 Sep 2011 19:55:47 +0000

This past summer in Greece I cemented my affections for pork butt, a particular cut of pork that’s diverse, very forgiving to cook with and it always come out juicy and delicious. The pork butt comes from the front end of the pig (nowhere near its rear), located near the shoulder. It’s not as pretty as your usual curved center-cut pork but it makes it up with flavour and juicyness.

Your usual pork chops have all the fat surrounding the meat but the pork butt contains fat within the meat as well. Dare I say some marbling? Much like beef steaks, pork butt chops render fat when cooking, creating a kind of self-basting and protecting the meat from drying out. This cut of meat is forgiving, hard to screw up but not without some precautions:

Grill over medium-high heat as you’re dealing with pork – you want well-cooked meat and to allow some time for the fat to render;
Ensure you are giving pork butt – not shoulder. These two cuts are connected to each other on the pig but they are very different: pork butt contains fat in the meat and pork shoulder’s fat is only located around the meat;
In Greece this cut is called “laimo” (lemmo) and all the butchers will know what you’re talking about

Pork butt is also very diverse! Other than in being my preferred cut for pork chops it’s also used to make pork Gyro, souvlaki, an ideal cut for grinding for sausage use and I also use pork butt to make a Greek specialty: Kontosouvli!

This past summer I rushed from the center of Thessaloniki to catch a bus back to my family’s summer home in Halkidiki and I just missed my bus by 5 minutes. It was lunch time and I had an hour to kill so I headed towards the food concessions in the terminal and found the Gyro joint also offered thin-cut pork chops wrapped in pita bread with your favourite toppings.

Think deconstructed Gyro as you get a whole pork chop, sliced thin and grilled and slapped in pita bread with fixins’. So simple yet so brilliant! Head to your favourite butcher and ask for pork butt. For thick-cut pork chops ask for bone-in and if you want to make souvlaki, Gyro, kontosouvli or pork butt Gyro, ask for boneless so you can easily cut the pork the way you like it.

I’m hungry all over again and I could go for a pork butt Gyro sandwich right about now.

Pork Butt Gyro (Γυρο με Μπριζολα Λαιμου)

(makes 4-6 sandwiches)

approx. 1 lb. boneless pork butt

1 small onion, passed through a box grater

1/4 cup olive oil

1 tsp. sweet paprika

1/2 tsp. black pepper

1 1/2 tsp. sea salt

1/2 tsp. dried Greek oregano

lemon juice

warm pita bread

your favourite souvlaki condiment/toppings: tomatoes, sliced onions, fries, Tzatziki, ketchup, mustard

If your butcher hasn’t already done so for you, place your pork in the freezer for about an hour so that it hardens enough for you to be able to slice it thinly. Once firm enough, take out of freezer and slice the pork but into approx. 1 cm. slices.
In a bowl, add the pork butt along with the oil, onion, salt, pepper, paprika and oregano and toss to coat. Cover and place in your fridge for about three hours. Remove from the fridge and allow to come to room temperature before grilling.
Pre-heat your gas or charcoal grill with the intent of attaining a medium-high heat. Brush your grill surface free of any residue and wipe the surface with a paper towel dipped in vegetable oil. Lightly season the pork with salt and over medium high heat for 3 minutes a side and once cooked, remove from the heat.
Squeeze some lemon juice and sprinkle some Greek oregano. Place the pork chop in the warm pita bread then add your favourite condiments and roll up. Have an ice cold Fix Hellas beer and enjoy!

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© 2011, Peter Minakis. All rights reserved. If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at http://kalofagas.ca then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at truenorth67 AT gmail DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author.

Kontosouvli

Peter Minakis — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 13:43:19 +0000

In Greece, there are many souvlaki and gyro joints all over the country and on nearly every corner. Then there are tavernas, small eateries that specialize in grilled meats that go beyond souvlaki and gyro, serving pork chops, biftekia, sausages, lamb chops, whole roast lamb on the spit, kokoretsi and kontosouvli. Kontosouvli another rotisserie offering where large chunks of pork are marinated then skewered and secured by a rod/spit and slow-roasted over an open charcoal pit.

Each Easter I like to add a new recipe or two to the usual fare served at Easter and this year the new addition was Kontosouvli. Beyond requiring a rotisserie to make it, the ingredients needed are accessible to most, affordable, easy to prepare and the end result is juicy pork meat that’s shaved off the main body of meat, served to your guests until more of the meat is ready to be eaten.

Kontosouvli is not one of those meat dishes where there’s a defined start and finish to the meat. The exterior meat gets cooked, slightly crisp and it begs to be sliced-off and eaten. Continue to cook until the new outer layer is well-cooked and slice-off some more! This is a backyard offering, a party offering and I’d recommend serving this alongside some other meats (as the whole Kontosouvli is not ready at one time).

There’s little prep required other than to cut-up your meat and prepare the marinade. The meat used here is my favourite of the pig – the pork butt. Also known as the Boston Butt, this cut comes from the upper shoulder from the front of the pig and it may contain the blade shoulder. When ordering a pork butt, it’s best to order a boneless cut and make sure the butcher does not give you the shoulder…a much different cut. The pork butt has fat contained in the meat (the shoulder cut’s fat is around the meat) and this fat melts away as the meat is cooked…leaving you with tender, succulent meat.

The marinade I chose for Kontosouvli is grated onion (an excellent meat tenderizer), some garlic, red wine, sweet paprika and salt and pepper. That is all! The large pieces of pork butt get tossed int the marinade and are refrigerated overnight until you’re ready to fire-up your gas or charcoal rotisserie and soon, you’ll have discovered a new party favourite to serve for family and friends.

Kontosouvli (Κοντοσούβλι)

(serves a large party/group of about 10)

approx. 6lbs. of pork butt

1 medium onion, passed through a box grater

2-3 large cloves of garlic, minced

1 Tbsp. of sweet paprika

2 tsp. dried Greek oregano

1/2 cup dry red wine

2 tsp. ground pepper

3 tsp. of sea salt

extra-sea salt for final seasoning

In a large bowl, add your grated onion, garlic, paprika, oregano, red wine, salt and pepper and stir to mix. Now your pork butt into large chucks, about the size of your palm and place in the marinade and toss until well-coated. Cover and place in your fridge overnight.
The next day, prepare your rotisserie. If using a charcoal pit, you’re looking for a medium heat (be able to count to 7 when placing your hands over the embers). If operating a gas grill, remove the grates and place a tray with water under where your rotisserie will operate. The drip pan with water will keep your grill clean, prevent flare-ups from occurring as the fat renders).
Take your marinated pork meat out of the fridge and allow to return to room temperature. Skewer the meat onto the spit and secure at each end and ensure your gas or charcoal grill has a medium heat. Season the meat with some coarse sea salt and place your Kontosouvli over the heat. If using gas grill, you may lower the lid as well. Check/replenish drip pan with water every half-hour (charcoal grill doesn’t need) one and after about 1 hour, you’ll begin to slice-off some of the outer layer of meat.
Continue to slice-off meat as the Kontosouvli cooks, squeeze some lemon juice on the meat and sprinkle with dried Greek oregano. Serve with good crusty bread and Tsantali Makedonikos Red.

“Kontosouvli“

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If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at http://kalofagas.ca then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at truenorth67 AT gmail DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author.

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From Athens to Adana to Istanbul: The Kebab

Peter Minakis — Sun, 28 Nov 2010 18:45:14 +0000

This past summer saw me travel to both Greece and Turkey: neighbors, once foes, current rivals and friendly neighbors. Confused? There’s a lot of history between these two nations and to this day, ripples from the Ottoman Empire are felt in Greece (some good, some bad). Greece and Turkey also share some similarities when it comes to food and often, it’s one of the facets that improves Greek-Turkish relations. One might hear a Greek curse at the Turks for another “military flying exercise” through the Greek airspace in the Aegean yet in the same conversation also talk of the best pistachio Baklava they ever had…in Istanbul! Just one of the many paradoxes.

Crossing the Greek-Turkish border, Evros

Another food that’s shared in both Greece and Turkey is the Kebab. The Kebab I’m talking about is the ground meat that’s skewered and then grilled over hot charcoal embers. The most famous version of the Kebab in Greece has to be Thanassi’s in the Monastiraki area of Athens. It is made of ground beef (or veal) and likely there is a percentage of ground pork in the mixture. This kebab is served with skewered ripe tomatoes that also placed over a charcoal pit and served with the kebab, sliced red onions and pita bread.

The Turkish Kebab has it’s origins in Adana, an ancient Greek city (even cited as Adana in Homer’s Iliad). Adana is located in the eastern Mediterranean (just inland from the coast that sits across from Cyprus) and it’s Turkey’s 4th largest city. The Adana Kebab (as known in Turkey) is extremely popular and can be found on menus throughout Turkey and restaurants around the world. The Adana Kebab is made of ground lamb with about 20% of the mixture consisting of tail fat from a lamb. The lamb meat is seasoned with finely shopped onions, spices, red pepper paste (Biber Salcasi) and minced by hand with the use if a Mezzaluna. A handful of meat is then affixed on the long flat skewers and then squeezed along the metal skewer to form a long, slender kebab.

The Kebab (unlike usual grilling) is suspended over the charcoal pit – no direct contact with the grill surface and with gravity coming into play, the fear of your Kebabs falling off your skewers becomes very real. There are a few tips one must follow if you want to successfully grill Kebabs:

You need the flat metal skewers that will better hold onto the ground meat mixture
The ground meat mixture needs approx 20% fat in it so that your mixture will adhere to the skewers and not fall off
Your meat mixture must not be overly wet or, again your meat will fall off the skewers. Finely chopped onions rather than grated grated onion work best
The use of a food processor is recommended to knead and blend the Kebab mixture before shaping on to the skewers
adding some baking soda into the meat mixture will help bind and lighten the density of the minced mixture

There are two paths one can take when deciding what meat mixture to use. The Thanassi’s Kebab version utilizes ground beef (or veal) with some ground pork in the mix acting as the fat component. One could also use ground lamb with pork or go all-out pork. I like the ground beef plus pork mixture (closer to Thanassi’s).

The Turkish Kebab mixture is a little trickier to emulate as it’s difficult to find the lamb’s tail fat used in the ground lamb mixture. Your best bet is to use ground lamb shoulder in the mix or a combo of ground lamb shoulder and ground chuck beef (also containing some fat). Turkey is a predominantly Muslim nation and I ground pork wouldn’t be included in the mix.

To accompany the Kebab, some good pita bread is lightly grilled and then cut into pieces and placed on your serving platter. The Greeks will also serve a garnish of sliced red onions and the Turks often serve a salad of sliced onions and parsley tossed in sumac and salt. In both the Greek and Turkish versions, roasted tomatoes are served (plus mildly hot green peppers in Turkey). You’ll need ripe tomatoes and one can either skewer the tomatoes whole on a separate skewer or thick tomato segments and peppers at the end of your Kebab skewer.

Finally, in both the Greek & Turkish Kebab, the skewers are suspended over the charcoal pit. These pits were designed for grilling kebabs and the skewers rest over the glowing embers. You and I do not have such equipment but you can place some bricks on both ends of your gas or charcoal grill and allow the skewers to rest on them. Make a batch of rice pilaf, serve up some homemade pita bread and serve the Kebabs with the roast tomato and green pepper kebabs, the onion salad with sumac and place some beers in the fridge to get chillin’.

Grilled Kebab With Warm Pita Bread & Onion & Parsley Salad

(served 4-6)

Kebab mixture

3/4 lb. of ground beef + 1/4 lb. ground pork

3/4 ground lamb shoulder + 1/4lb. ground chuck beef

1 medium onion, finely chopped

1 clove of garlic, minced

1 large egg

2 slices of stale bread (soaked in water, squeezed dry then crumbled)

1 tsp. of ground cumin

1 tsp. of ground allspice

1 Tbsp. of red pepper paste (or 1 Tbsp. of tomato paste mixed with 1/2 tsp. of sweet paprika & pinch of cayenne)

1 Tbsp. dried Greek oregano

1/2 tsp. of baking soda

1/2 tsp. of ground pepper

1 1/2 tsp. of sea salt

Garnish

grilled tomatoes and peppers

olive oil

salt and pepper

Onion, Parsley and Sumac Salad

1 medium red onion, peeled and thinly sliced

1/2 cup chopped fresh parsley

1 tsp. of ground Sumac

salt to taste

Add your Greek or Turkish ground meat mixture into a food processor along with the remaining ingredients and pulse until the mixture is homogeneous and adheres well. Take enough meat to make a small meatball and fry it off in a small pan. Taste and adjust accordingly with salt, pepper or with any of the other seasonings. Remove from the processor and place in a bowl and cover and place in your fridge for at least 4 hours (overnight is even better).
To form the Kebabs, divide the meat into equal portions and form into a meatball. Now form the meatball around the middle part of your skewer and then squeeze the meat mixture along the skewer. You should be able to form a long, slender kebab that’s about 6-7 inches along. Now, using your index and thumb, gently squeeze around the meat in 1/2 inch increments to form the ridged pattern.
If you have extra skewers, you may place whole ripe tomatoes alternating with segments of green (I like hot) peppers or skewer them at the top end of your meat Kebabs (it’s a good idea to measure how much grilling surface you have as the bricks placed on both sides of your grill will reduce the length available). Brush the tomatoes and peppers with olive oil and season lightly with salt and pepper.
Place a row of bricks on the top and bottom end of your gas or charcoal grill. Pre-heat your grill to a medium-high (approx. 375F). In the meantime, make your onion salad by thinly slicing it and ten placing it in a bowl with enough cold water to just cover it (skip this step if you like your onions zesty). Allow to stand for 5 minutes and then drain well and add to a bowl with the chopped fresh parsley, salt to taste and Sumac. Toss well and add some salt and pepper to taste, toss again and reserve.
Your grill should be ready by now and you may place the skewers on the rows of brick that were placed on your gas or charcoal grill. Grill the kebabs, flipping them frequently so that the meat on both sides of the skewer cook evenly and at the same rate. Cook for about 15 minutes or until just golden-brown. If the tomatoes and peppers are on separate skewers, again cook on both sides, about 15 minutes total, rotating often.
Remove the skewers from the grill and allow to rest five minutes. Brush the pita breads lightly with olive oil and grill for a minute a side. Cut the pita bread into pieces and place on your plate or platter. Remove the Kebabs from the skewers (careful the skewers may still be hot).
Serve with the roasted tomatoes and peppers and divide and plate the Onion, parsley and Sumac salad. A side of rice pilaf is apt for the occasion and some cold beer along with your Kebabs.

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© 2010, Peter Minakis. All rights reserved. If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at http://kalofagas.ca then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at truenorth67 AT gmail DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author.

Beer-Can Chicken With Lemon Verbena & Thyme

Peter Minakis — Wed, 03 Nov 2010 16:00:00 +0000

I’ve been enjoying this method of preparing chicken for years now. I have yet to find anyone not like it…what’s not to like about moist chicken with crispy skin? Beer can chicken works as such: open a can of beer, drink about 1/3 of the beer, you may add add aromatics into the beer like herbs, garlic, etc. The chicken is placed on to the beer can (up into the cavity) and the beer can plus the two legs act as a tripod. The chicken stands in your grill or oven in an upright position and the magic begins.

What’s happening here is the beer steams inside the chicken’s cavity, leaving you with a moist chicken, perfumed lightly with the aroma and flavour of the beer and anything else you added to the can. The skin becomes crispy, golden-brown. This is one of my favourite ways to prepare roast chicken and the method can easily be adapted to roasting in your home’s oven.

If using your gas or charcoal grill, beer can chicken works with indirect heat. You want one side of your grill to have heat and the other to be without any heat source. The beer-can chicken is placed on the side with no heat and the lid is closed. What now occurs is a circulation of heat – much like what happens in a conventional oven. Conversely, beer can chicken can also be done in your oven with placement of the bird simply being on the lower-middle rack.

In both cases, a drip pan must be used as fat renders and some liquid from within the can may still bubble out (that’s really why you drink a 1/3 of the beer). You don’t want fat flare-ups occuring in your grill and you certainly don’t to create a mess in your oven either! There are many stands for beer can chicken out there…tailored for both outdoor and indoor (oven) use. This simple beer can holder works well in both instances.

The dressing of your bird is really up to you and I change-up the flavours depending on my mood, what herbs are available to me. On this occasion I used lemon verbena and thyme, both from my garden. Chicken (poultry) loves lemon and I always squeeze lemon juice on my chicken. I also like to add the same flavourings into the beer can.

Today, I’m using garlic, olive oil, salt and pepper, sweet paprika, lemon juice, lemon verbena and thyme. As a side, I made some garlic-mashed potatoes and served a side of steamed broccoli and cauliflower tossed in extra-virgin olive oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper and chopped fresh chives.

Beer-Can Chicken With Lemon Verbena & Thyme

1 whole roaster chicken
1/2 small lemon

1 tsp. sweet paprika
2 tsp. fresh thyme
1 Tbsp. fresh lemon verbena, chopped
1 clove of garlic, smashed
1 clove of garlic, minced
approx. 1 Tbsp. olive oil
coarse sea alt and fresh ground pepper

1 can of beer

Rinse and pat-dry your chicken. In a bowl, add your olive oil, minced garlic, paprika, thyme and lemon verbena and reserve. Light your BBQ and only have 1 burner lit with the lid closed and adjust the dial so that you get a BBQ temperature of approx/ 350-375F. Open your can of beer, drink a 1/3 of it and place into the stand. Insert any aromatic you like into the beer (I added the smashed clove of garlic, the leftover lemon peel, some thyme sprigs and lemon verbena leaves).
Put the chicken, stand and drip-tray in the side of the BBQ that’s not lit. Close your BBQ and allow the chicken to roast for about 80-90 minutes or until an internal temp. of 180F is reached or juices run clear.
Check the chicken every-so often in case of BBQ hot spots and rotate the bird to roast & colour evenly. Allow your chicken to rest for 15 minutes before carving and serve.
Serve with garlic mashed potatoes, steamed cauliflower and broccoli. Serve with a Kir Yianni Petra Roditis white.

*Beer can chicken is just as easy – middle rack position, pre-heated 375F oven, place chicken on beer can stand on a tray to catch drippings.

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Harvey’s Hamburger (Home Version)

Peter Minakis — Sat, 24 Jul 2010 13:07:58 +0000

Growing up in Canada and the US, one is never too far from a burger joint. I can’t think of any friends who didn’t enjoy a hamburger – be it at home or out with family or friends. One of my earliest memories of a eating hamburgers was at McDonald’s….long time ago when they were actually good! There’s Burger King, there’s Wendy’s, there’s even A & W! Before during after the era of the franchise burger joint also existed the independent – the family-run (usually Greek) burger joint that would offer hamburgers (some pre-made source) or their homeburgers and even a souvlaki !

There is definitely a burger renaissance taking place. You have an endless list of topping options, different burgers for different tastes: sirloin, Angus, Kobe, Prim Rib burger, lean, extra-lean, do you order well-done or rare, do I step out of the box and have a lamb burger or the unthinkable…a veggie burger! There are sliders (small burgers that can be downed in a couple of bites) and there are gourmet burgers: prime cuts of beef ground and formed into patties and accompanied by double-smoked bacon, artisan cheeses, foie gras, heirloom tomatoes, chipotle sauces, cilantro mayo, red pepper relish, pickled onions.

The only other “fast food” I can think of that occupies so many storefronts and exceeds the demands of the burger would be the pizza. Burgers are loved, consumed by kids and adults alike and they are quick, can be affordable (don’t top with foie gras or a lobster claw) and they are most satiating. Out of all the burgers that are on offer here (Toronto and Canada), I’d have to say my favourite is a Harvey’s hamburger. Harvey’s is a household name amongst Canadians, some Americans might have tried this tasty burger and even some other tourists from overseas.

Out of all the burger choices offered out there, Harvey’s is my favourite: it’s a great tasting burger, the service quick, the meals affordable and the burgers are grilled in front of you and the toppings are your standard fare (they have expanded the selection of late). Harvey’s is juicy, it’s consistent and I recently had one of their burgers as part of a lunch on the fly. Upon tasting the burger all by itself, I noticed that the Harvey’s burger is pretty much a Salisbury steak, served up in burger form.

Based on my tastebuds, memory and scanning some recipes for Salisbury steak, I think I have a good version of the homemade Harvey’s hamburger. The ingredients are very basic, simple and easy to find. You need Worcestershire sauce, slice bread and egg for binding, ketchup, salt and pepper and a packet of dried French Onion Soup mix, the kind also used to make the potato chip dip.

That’s it! No herbs, no other spices. I used a lean ground beef for this recipe as the burgers arern’t too thick and aren’t apt to dry out on you. I’ve also used a ring mold to shape the patties into near-perfect round disks, just like at the burger joint. If you can’t find the French onion soup mix in your area, try grating a medium onion, add some beef stock to soak your bread and you should be able to emulate the same effect (you can also make your own dried soup mix).

The hamburger is a sandwich and like in any sandwich, the choice of a good bread is important. Make your own buns or choose/buy a good hamburger bun. Toppings? The choice is yours but I like to keep it simple, preferring to be able to taste the burger. I like cheese, bacon, tomato, relish, red onions and pickle slices on my burger. How will you have your burger today?

Harvey’s Hamburger (Home Version)

(serves 4)

1 lb. of lean ground beef

1 clove of garlic

2-3 Tbsp. of French Onion Soup mix

2 tsp. Worcestershire sauce

2-3 slices of white (or wholewheat) bread, soaked lightly in milk or water

1 large egg

2 Tbsp. of ketchup

1/4 tsp. of black pepper

In a large bowl, add your slice bread plus 2 Tbsp. of the soup mix, ketchup and Worcestershire sauce. Mix the ingredients with your hands until they are amalgamated.
Now add your ground beef, minced garlic and large egg and mix well with your hands. Form into a small meatball, cook it off and taste. Adjust seasoning, add more soup mix if needed. Form into uniform, round patties or use a round mold to form into the perfect pattie, just like at the burger joint.
Place in the fridge (covered) to set for at least an hour or freeze for another time.
Pre-heat your gas or charcoal grill. Brush off the residue from the grill surface and you’re looking for a high heat. In the meantime, organize your toppings, condiments and buns.
Grill your burgers for about 3-4 minutes a side. Toast the buns, add cheese on the burger for those that like it (I DO, I DO) and serve with French Fries and a choice of condiments/toppings.

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© 2010 – 2011, Peter Minakis. All rights reserved. If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at http://kalofagas.ca then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at truenorth67 AT gmail DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author.