December 16 – December 22, 2024

Monday:                               Oven Roasted Chicken Schwarma

Tuesday:                               Pici Alla Boscaiola

Wednesday:                        Chicken Saltimbocca with Polenta

Thursday:                             Dunnings

Friday:                                   Pici con Pollo

Saturday:                              Penne with Vodka Sauce

Sunday:                                 Sausage, Mushroom and Green Pepper Pizza

Schwarma is Schwell (scheriously)

First – Merry Christmas and Happy Hannukah to all.  Sending out these blogs a week late is easier on my schedule, but confusing at holidays.

Second – Nephew Owen Stewart and his Highland Park football team in Dallas (the “Scots”), made it into the Texas High School State Championship Game.  Owen is #78 below:

And, one more note before the blog itself – here is Murph, who also wishes you a Merry Christmas and a Happy Hannukah, looking serious in his holiday outfi – he’s fooling no one:

Nearly everywhere in the Americas, Europe and the Middle East you will find large agglomerations of beef or lamb or chicken roasting on an upright spit, seasoned with Middle Eastern spices, basted by its own fats and perhaps the juice of a pineapple slice slowly deliquescing down the mounded sides of the meat.  Skilled servers using long knives will coax shavings of this mountain of meat onto some pita bread, add some tomatoes and cucumber and a yogurt sauce with tahini and hand you this delicious mélange of flavors and textures. 

I believe that this meal was the only thing our son Andrew ate during his semester in Barcelona.  In Pittsburgh you can now find brick-and-mortar schwarma restaurants,* as well as schwarma trucks.   And you can make schwarma yourself, even without a vertical rotisserie or 5 lbs. of thinly sliced meat.  It won’t be the same as having schwarma at a Lebanese restaurant in Barcelona, but, on the other hand, you won’t have to spend thousands of dollars and countless hours flying to Barcelona or Beirut and brushing up on your Spanish or your French or your Arabic.  So, you’ll be well ahead of the game and well fed as well.  [The last sentence contains too many ‘well’s, but I can’t figure out which ‘well’ to eliminate without deforming the sense of the thing.  “Also” just doesn’t have the valence I’m reaching for.]

*The Greek Gyro, a long-time staple of Pittsburgh cuisine, is similar to schwarma, but less exotically spiced.

Oven Roasted Chicken Schwarma

(adapted from Sam Sifton, NYT, February 1, 2015)

Timing:                      45 minutes plus time marinating (1-12 hours)

Ingredients:                                        Serves 4

2 pounds boneless, skinless chicken thighs, 1 large red onion, peeled and quartered), ½ cup plus one tablespoon olive oil, 2 lemons juiced, 6 cloves garlic smashed and minced – we used 3 cloves, 1 teaspoon kosher salt, 2 teaspoons ground black pepper

2 teaspoons ground cumin, 2 teaspoons paprika, ½ teaspoon turmeric, Pinch of ground cinnamon, Good pinch of red pepper-flakes, 2 tablespoons of chopped parsley

Pita Bread and White Sauce (see recipe below) for serving.

Prep:

I like to trim the chicken thighs of most fat and any cartilage the butcher has left on the thighs.

Make the marinade by combining the lemon juice, ½ cup olive oil, garlic, salt, pepper, cumin, paprika, turmeric, cinnamon and red-pepper flakes in a large bowl and whisk to combine.

Add the chicken and toss well to coat.  Cover and store in refrigerator for at least 1 hour and up to 12.

Before cooking, quarter onion, chop tomatoes and cucumbers into bite-sized pieces, make white sauce (see below) and warm pita bread and heat oven to 425 F.

Use the remaining tablespoon of oil to grease a rimmed sheet pan.

Cook:

Add quartered onion to the chicken and marinade and toss to coat.  Remove chicken and onion from the marinade and place on the rimmed sheet pan, spreading them evenly across the pan.

Put pan in oven and roast until chicken is brown and crisp at the edges and cooked through – 35 minutes or maybe 40.

Remove from oven, allow to cool for maybe two minutes and then slice chicken into bits and onion into pieces.  Heat Pita while chicken cools.

Serve:

Put chicken and onion on a platter and scatter parsley over the top.  Serve with tomatoes, cucumbers, pita, and white sauce. (You can add hot sauce, olives, fried eggplant, feta, rice.  We added feta and pitted olives.)

White Sauce

1 cup Greek yogurt, 2 tablespoons tahini, 1 lemon juiced, 1 teaspoon kosher salt, ½ teaspoon ground black pepper, 2 teaspoons chopped parsley, 2 tablespoons of water

Make Sauce:

Place all ingredients in a bowl and whisk to combine.  Add more water, if too thick.