Greek Gyro Meat

If there is one thing you won’t forget about a visit to Greece is the street stands with the beautiful spits of tender meat. Served with fresh, fluffy pita, and crisp vegetables. It’s seriously some of the best cuisine, and the best part is that you don’t need a big spit to recreate this meal at home. This Gyro Meat recipe is at-home friendly. The traditional gyro meat is cooked on a spit for hours and hours, giving it a bit of a different consistency than this quick, at-home version, but it’s still so good.

❤️ Why You’ll Love Gyro Meat

• Versatile: You can eat this meat on its own, with fries or these Greek Potatoes, you can even serve this meat in a delicious bowl or salad
• Juicy: Cooking your meat this way in the oven makes it so juicy, tender, and flavorful
• Delicious: The combination of meat, seasonings, and slow cooking this meat makes it so flavorful

🍲 Ingredients

Ground Beef – Use a low-fat, lean beef. This is really important to have the best consistency and the least grease in your final product.

Ground Lamb – Lamb is okay to be high in fat because that’s just what you get, and combined with the beef it’s just so good. I love lamb because it adds a unique flavor. However, if it’s not your thing you can definitely substitute it for more beef.

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👩‍🍳 How to Make Gyro Meat

1. Preheat oven to 400F.
2. In a large bowl mix all of the ingredients together in a bowl using your hands or a spatula to ensure everything is combined.
3. Use a vertical spit (meant for oven use) OR use an onion half as a base and position two to four skewers vertically into the onion like a spit on a sheet pan lined with foil.
4. You’re going to form the meat mixture around the vertical spit, sort of creating a stand-up ‘meatloaf’ – here’s how: Start by adding meat to the base of the spit, about 2 inches in height and 4 inches wide, forming the meat around the spit in a circular shape. Use a long piece of tin foil, folded in half lengthwise, and wrap it around to create a tall collar. Use oven-safe clips to hold it in place or fold it over around the top to hold it in place. Fill the collar with the rest of the meat mixture, a handful at a time, putting the handful through the spit each time. Gently press down after each addition. Once the collar is filled, use one more long piece of tin foil, folded over twice lengthwise, wrapping it around the base of the collar – it will touch the base of the pan.
5. Bake for 45 minutes and then remove the foil collars. Baste the meat with the pan juices and then bake for 30-45 more minutes or until the internal temperature of the meat reaches 160°F, baste the meat with any pan juices again during the second half of cooking. Let cool for 30 minutes before slicing/carving off slices. Serve with pita, tzatziki, or use to top our Gyro fries recipe.

🪄 Tips and Tricks

For this Gyro Meat recipe, I used a vertical pan. It essentially is a high-brimmed pan with a skewer in the middle that allows for you to easily stack the meat and resembles a spit like the traditional Gyro Meat you see at shawarma shops or on the streets of Greece. However, since you might not have something like this, you can use a cake tin with some pre-soaked wooden skewers. You can help the skewers stand by inserting them in half of an onion.

🗒 Substitutions

• Ground Lamb: If you don’t want to use lamb, substitute it with an equal amount of lean ground beef
• Avocado Oil: Olive oil will work just as good

🗒 Best served with

• Pita 
• Tzatziki
• Gyro Fries

👝 How to Store Leftovers

Store leftover meat off the skewer in an airtight container for up to 4 days in the fridge. Us this Gyro Meat in pitas, salads, bowls, or whatever you wish. It’s so versatile!

🤔 Common Questions

Greek Gyro Meat

5 from 1 vote

This Greek Gyro Meat recipe recreates the traditional street food in an easy, at-home version of the recipe that is flavorful and so versatile.

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Prep Time 15 minutes mins

Cook Time 1 hour hr 15 minutes mins

Resting time 30 minutes mins

Total Time 2 hours hrs

Course Main

Cuisine Greek

Servings 6 -8

Calories 415 kcal

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Ingredients

  

1x2x3x

• 1 lb lean ground beef
• 1 lb ground lamb
• 2 cups breadcrumbs
• 1 white onion, grated
• 4 garlic cloves, pressed
• 3 tsp salt
• 1 tsp pepper
• 1 tbsp dried oregano
• 2 tsp cumin
• 1 small tomato, grated
• 4 tbsp avocado oil (we love to use Chosen Foods)
• 2 tbsp red wine vinegar
• 2 tbsp plain Greek yogurt

Instructions

 

• Preheat oven to 400F.
• In a large bowl mix all of the ingredients together in a bowl using your hands or a spatula to ensure everything is combined.
• Use a vertical spit (meant for oven use) OR use an onion half as a base and position two-four skewers vertically into the onion like a spit on a sheet pan lined with foil.
• You're going to form the meat mixture around the vertical spit, sort of creating a stand-up ‘meatloaf’ – here's how:

  Start by adding meat to the base of the spit, about 2 inches in height and 4 inches wide, forming the meat around the spit in a circular shape. Use a long piece of tin foil, folded in half lengthwise and wrap around to create a tall collar. Use oven safe clips to hold in place or fold over around the top to hold in place. Fill the collar with the rest of the meat mixture, a handful at a time, putting the handful through the spit each time. Gently press down after each addition. Once the collar is filled, use one more long piece of tin foil, folded over twice lengthwise, wrapping it around the base of the collar – it will touch the base of the pan.
• Bake for 45 minutes and then remove the foil collars. Baste the meat with the pan juices and then bake for 30-45 more minutes or until the internal temperature of the meat reaches 160°F, baste the meat with any pan juices again during the second half of cooking. Let cool for 30 minutes before slicing / carving off slices. Serve with pita, tzatziki or use to top our Gyro fries recipe.

Notes

• If you don’t want to use lamb, substitute with an equal amount of lean ground beef.
• Serve with our pita recipe, tzatziki or use to top our Gyro fries recipe.
• If you love this recipe, try our Greek Chicken Gyros (Authentic Cooking Method)

Nutrition

Calories: 415kcal | Carbohydrates: 22.7g | Protein: 26.2g | Fat: 23.7g | Saturated Fat: 7.8g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 2.7g | Monounsaturated Fat: 11.4g | Trans Fat: 0.1g | Cholesterol: 75.4mg | Sodium: 1144mg | Fiber: 1.9g | Sugar: 2.8g

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