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Souvlaki - Greek Kabobs

Part 2 of our Greek/Med dinner I started posting last week.

From Wikipedia:
Souvlaki or souvlakia is a popular Greek fast food consisting of small pieces of meat and sometimes vegetables grilled on a skewer. It may be served on the skewer for eating out of hand, in a pita sandwich with garnishes and sauces, or on a dinner plate ready for insertion, often with fried potatoes or pilaf. The meat is traditionally pork in Greece and Cyprus, or in modern times increasingly chicken. In other countries and for tourists, souvlaki may be made with other meats such as beef, lamb and sometimes fish (especially swordfish).
The terminology of souvlaki and its variants is confusing and inconsistent. Depending on the context, the term 'souvlaki' by itself may refer to any of the variants. In some regions and some restaurants, the name shish kebab is used to denote a particular variant of souvlaki (e.g. with vegetables on the skewer), but it is essentially a synonym.
The word souvlaki is a diminuative of souvla (skewer), itself ultimately derived from the Latin subula (awl).


To make our souvlaki I used a pork tenderloin, parsley, mint, onion, garlic, oregano, salt, pepper, red wine vinegar and olive oil. You'll also need some form of skewers and an indoor grill pan or outdoor grill.



The recipe called for marinating in a bowl for 2 hours to overnight, I like using Alton Brown's method of a plastic baggie holding the marinade then set into a bowl just in case, the baggie is thrown away afterward and hopefully I have one less bowl to wash.

Instead of really measuring, I pulled a handful of parsley and gave it a rough chop, I stacked about 8 mint leaves and chopped them a little, and a good heavy sprinkling of dried oregano (I couldn't find fresh in the grocey) all went into the gallon sized baggie.

Then a quartered onion and a couple smashed and peeled garlic cloves joined the herbs.



I poured in about a half cup of olive oil and roughly a 1/3 cup of red wine vinegar.



This is the pork tenderloin I bought, I only used one of the pieces, it comes sliced in about half, so close to one pound of meat to serve 3 adults and 2 kidlets.



I cut the tenderloin into slices more than 1 inch cubes, something like a 2 bite size.



Toss the meat into the baggie with a healthy pinch of salt and a 1/2 tsp or so of fresh pepper and refrigerate for a minimum of 2 hours, or let go overnight. I did all this part the morning of the day we were going to eat.



These are the skewers I have, I don't like using the wooden skewers because you have to soak them to keep them from catching on fire. I really do like those spiral skewers but have yet to find someplace that doesn't charge $20 for 4 skewers. These are metal and $2 at your nearest Wallyworld, mine get used mostly for roasting marshmallows on the gas cooktop but whatever.



I started the box o' pilaf we were having with this dinner and had the pita and tzatziki made so now it was time to cook the pork. I pulled the marinated meat out of the fridge and skewered it, I used the large pieces of onion to help keep the meat on the skewer and the rest went into the squash (recipe next week). The grill was heated to medium, about 350 degrees.



The skewers were placed across the and cooked for 5-6 minutes per side, tongs came in very handy here. I let one set cook for a couple minutes longer per side, Mom has an abject fear of moist pork.



After they were cooked I put the pita on the grill to reheat it. The pork came out very tasty with a slight flavor of the herbs and being tenderloin was very tender.

Next week I'll post the final part of this dinner, the squash side dish and the tzatziki sauce that's really good for just about anything.

Ingredients:
1 lb pork tenderloin, cut into bite sized pieces
1/2 cup olive oil
1/3 cup red wine vinegar
2 cloves garlic, smashed with a can and peeled
1 medium onion, quartered
1 tbsp oregano, fresh or dried
2 tbsp fresh parsley, roughly chopped
1 tbsp fresh mint, roughly chopped
salt and pepper

Combine all the ingredients and marinate 2 hours to overnight. Skewer the meat (remember to soak wooden skewers) and grill 5-6 minutes per side.

Pita Bread

I really like trying to make different ethnic foods, Chinese, Latin, Italian and some Mediterranean. We really like Gyros around here, the ground lamb or beef mixed with spices and cooked on a spit, I've found a restaurant that makes that better than I can (they have a spit) so I've given up trying to make Gyros and have moved on to other Med/Greek and some Turkish foods.

This recipe is part 1 of a 3 part series on a dinner we had of Pita, Pork Souvlaki with Tzatziki Sauce and Sauteed Squash. We also had rice pilaf but it was an out of box mix, I have trouble cooking rice that does not come in a mix or minute box.

This is the first pita recipe I came across and I just kept coming back to the easiness of it, it might not be the best one but the flavor was right and if I'd made my dough balls a little smaller they might have puffed up more.

What You Need: AP Flour, Active Dry Yeast, Salt, Honey and Water, the Olive Oil is for coating the bowl for rising.

Add a half cup of warm water and 1 tbsp of honey to the yeast and let it bloom, I like recipes that start with this step so I can make sure my grocery store yeast is still good without throwing an entire recipes' worth of ingredients in the garbage.

Sift 3 cups of flour with 1 tsp salt and add to the yeast mix (in a bigger bowl). Combine and add another cup of flour and 1 cup water. Mix with a spoon then switch to using your hands, if it's still too dry add up to another half cup water. Turn out onto a lightly floured surface and knead for 5 minutes. It should be a little sticky.

Add a couple tablespoons of olive oil to a clean bowl and swirl around to coat the sides, add the dough ball and flip it over to coat it with the oil. Cover with plastic wrap or a towel and let rise to double in size about an hour.

Punch the dough down and with as little kneading as possible divide into at least 10 balls ( I did 8 and they were just too much). Flatten these with your hands to about 1/4 inch thickness (you want a 6 inch or so circle or close to it) and place on a greased pan. Let rise again for about 30 minutes til again doubled in size.


I was in a bit of a hurry at this point so yeah they be ugly.

Bake on the bottom rack of the oven at 450 for 5-6 minutes.


Let them cool on a wire rack, and they are ready to eat.

Since I made these in the afternoon, while grilling the meat for the Souvlaki I threw these on the grill as well to toast the outside a little and reheat them.

Ingredients:
1 packet active dry yeast
1 tbsp honey
1/2 cup warm water
1 and 1/2 cups warm water
4 cups all-purpose flour and extra for board
1 tsp salt
Olive oil for the bowl


Instructions:
Combine yeast, honey and half cup water and let stand for 10 minutes. (The blooming part)

Sift 3 cups flour with salt and add to yeast mix.

Add 1 more cup of flour and up to 1 and a half cups water, mix with spoon and then hands.

Knead the dough on a floured surface for about 5 minutes. Dough should be a little sticky.

Lightly oil a clean bowl. Put the dough in the bowl, cover and let rise for about 1 hour.

Divide dough into 10-12 pieces and pat into inch circles, place on greased pan and let rise again for 30 minutes.

Bake for 5-6 minutes on the bottom rack of a 450 degree oven.

Cool on a wire rack, and if you want to add some color, throw on the grill for a few minutes just before serving.