How many chicken recipes have you tried making so far? If you are bored of making the same usual and boring chicken gravy, then the Chicken Shawarma Masala can be an excellent change to your palate.
A lot of people love to eat chicken in their daily meals. However, fewer of them know how to make a delicious chicken recipe. If you are a true foodie, you would know how many chicken dishes can be made to rock your party platter.
Chicken Shawarma is one such tempting Mediterranean chicken dish that you can make over your weekend celebration. It is a popular dish that originated in the middle east. However, it has become a popular street food around the globe now.
Chicken Shawarma
The traditional chicken shawarma is well-marinated chicken meat barbequed slowly over the coal. Roasting the beef over the coal gives it a sharp and intense flavor and charred crispiness.
Traditionally, chicken shawarma is served with pita bread where the bread is filled with yummy chicken shawarma, onion, chilies, and lemon squeezed over it to give that phenomenal taste. However, you can serve chicken shawarma with other flatbread or rice, depending upon your preference.
Although chicken Shawarma is a chicken dish, as the name suggests, some people also use beef or mutton meat to make this dish.
The blend of hot and flavorful spices on the meat marinade gives the chicken shawarma dish an incredible taste. Hence, you can make it over a weekend to serve yourself and your guests or as an excellent companion to your drinks.
Keep reading this article to learn more about making chicken shawarma at home.
Ingredients Required
For marination
Shawarma Spices
Boneless chicken
Lemon
Cooking oil
Garlic
What are Shawarma spices?
Shawarma spices are a mixture of hot spice ingredients that one can use to make shawarma with any meat or vegetables.
It constitutes spices like cayenne pepper, coriander, cumin, paprika, salt, and pepper. The hotness of the chicken is entire because of the use of cayenne pepper
Thus, if you want to reduce the spice level of this dish, you better minimize the amount of this pepper in the shawarma spice mix.
For making sauce
Yogurt
Lemon
Garlic
How To Cook Chicken Shawarma
Making chicken shawarma could be a little tiring for some people as it involves a marination step. Whereas, Some people can’t wait for the food that they want to eat. However, the exceptional taste of this dish is worth the wait.
If you want to make chicken shawarma at home then it involves two significant steps, one from marinating the chicken and the other for actually cooking it. One can also opt to marinate the chicken a day in advance and keep it overnight in the fridge. The process therefore penetrate the spices deep into the meat and make this dish tastier.
Steps involved in marinating the chicken
- Take the boneless chicken in a bowl and wash it with clean water. Allow all the excess water to dry out and now put it in a separate bowl.
- Mix the shawarma spices separately in another container. You can use a zip lock bag to mix the spice ingredients well. Control the spiciness level by limiting the cayenne pepper portion on it.
- Add chicken to the seasoning, grated garlic, salt, and olive oil, and mix it well. Keep on turning the chicken and rubbing the spices to distribute the spices over the chicken evenly.
- You may also use the ziplock sack to ensure the chicken coats well in spices.
- Allow this marinade to stay overnight so that the chicken gets that yummy taste.
Steps involved in roasting the chicken
It is suggested to cook this marinated chicken over coal in order to get that juicy and dense flavor. However, you can also cook this chicken on a stove or barbeque. Following are the steps involved in roasting the chicken.
- Burn the wood-free coal and let it be hot enough.
- Lay out a barbeque stand after rubbing it with oil so that chicken doesn’t stick to it. Now, place the chicken pieces on the shelf and allow the meat to cook.
- Drip off some oil if required and simmer this meat.
- When the meat is done, take it off the heat and sit for at least five minutes before tossing it into the sauce. It will help to drip off all the juiciness of the meat.
How to make the Chicken Shawarma sauce?
Chicken Shwarma served best with a tangy and yummy yogurt sauce. To make this sauce, you need a set of ingredients, mix them and layer it on a plate. The steps involved are:
- Take a bowl and add the required amount of yogurt.
- Add spices like cumin, pepper, and salt to it.
- Now add a spoonful of grated garlic.
- Squeeze a lemon on the mixture and mix the ingredients well. It would be best if you allowed this mixture to stand well before serving it.
The only thing now remaining is to serve and assemble the dish.
If you like bread then you can serve it as a shawarma roll or shawarma pockets. To make shawarma rolls, you need to layer yogurt sauce over the bread, add the chicken shawarma, and roll it.
Likewise, to make the pockets, you just cut the pita bread in the middle, make the bag’s shape, and fill it with chicken shawarma, you may also add green leafy vegetables to it for that extra punch.
If you refer to having rice, you can also serve it with a bowl of rice and the sauce as a side dish.