recipe
Homemade lamb souvlaki
It’s been more than three decades since I have lived in a city, but there are some things I still miss. Because I am within a couple of hours’ drive of Melbourne, it’s not that I can’t jump in my car to shop, attend cultural events or eat at wonderful restaurants. But one big-city convenience I continue to hanker for is takeaway meals on tap. It means if I want anything that resembles takeaway, I have to either make it myself or find a facsimile that can live in the freezer.
The rendering of a suitable homemade equivalent often falls short, not through lack of endeavour or skill but through something as banal as scale. To be successful in a takeaway food business, you have to work with volume. To succeed with volume, you have to invest in the right kit. Think of the massive deep fryers you see in a fish and chip shop, the equally large wok rings that are ever-present in noodle franchises, and the enormous spits that are in a souvlaki shop. There is something in cooking with these big rigs that creates a product that cannot be replicated at home. A family serve of fat chips needs a vast fryer to cook properly: it’s all about the oil not dropping in temperature to ensure a crisp result etc, etc. A souvlaki needs masses of meat carefully threaded onto a spit and rotated for many hours over hot coals – something not easily replicated at home. I miss takeaway souvlaki, though, and sometimes crave an approximation of the flavours.
So, here I take a lamb shoulder, rub it with oil and aromatics and cook it long and slow without much liquid. This gives a caramelised finish, reminiscent of the result that is achieved over coals. The shredding capacity of the shoulder meat emulates the carving of the layered meat from the spit. On a grilled flatbread, with a touch of yoghurt and fresh lemon, you can add tomato, onion and lettuce to create a takeaway experience at home, wherever you live.
Time: 15 minutes preparation + 6 hours cooking
Serves 6-8
Spiced lamb shoulder
- 1 tsp smoked paprika
- 1 tbsp dried oregano
- 2 garlic cloves crushed
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 boned lamb shoulder (about 1.2 kg)
- 2 lemons, zested
- olive oil
- 1 cup water
To serve as souvlaki:
- onion
- lettuce
- tomato
- yoghurt or tzatziki
- Preheat your oven to 130ºC.
- Mix the aromatics together and rub them over the lamb on both sides. Place in a baking tray that is a little larger than the lamb but not too large.
- Cut the zested lemons in quarters and arrange around the lamb. Drizzle with a little olive oil and add a cup of water to the pan.
- Cover with a sheet of baking paper and then a layer of foil tightly folded around the edges of the pan. Cook for six hours, checking after five. The end result should be a dark, caramelised lamb shoulder. If it is looking cooked (as in, the meat is soft to touch) but a little pallid, remove the coverings for the final hour of cooking.
- Drain off the fat and shred the meat in the pan. Squeeze any liquid and pulp from the cooked lemons into the pan. Place the shredded lamb on grilled flat bread and serve with fresh lemon, yoghurt or tzatziki and salad accompaniments.
Grilled flatbread
- 500g white bread flour
- 10g fine sea salt
- 10g dried yeast
- 350g/ml warm water (weigh it, don’t just measure it in a measuring jug)
- Place the flour and salt in a big mixing bowl.
- Add the yeast to the warm water and let it sit for a couple of minutes.
- Pour the yeast mixture into the bowl and, either with your fingers, a big spoon/spatula or a bread scraper, mix the lot together into a big shaggy mass.
- Tip the lot onto a floured board or benchtop and work the dough as follows: put your hands underneath it, lift it, slap it down on the board with a nice satisfying thwack, stretch the top of the dough out in front of you, then fold it back, taking care to do it gently, thus trapping air between the layers. Do this over and over again and if you keep lifting, slapping, stretching, folding, trapping air, the dough will start to form a homogenous smooth mass without the addition of any extra flour.
- Once you have a relatively smooth dough, place it on the board and form it into a ball by folding the edges into the centre, pressing down with your thumb, rotating the dough, folding and pressing. You should end up with a neatish ball.
- Rest the dough by putting it back in the mixing bowl, covering it with a tea towel then leaving it somewhere warm and draught-free for about an hour until it has doubled in size.
- Turn the dough out onto a floured surface and divide into six to eight portions. Roll each into a ball and then roll out with a rolling pin so they resemble small pizza bases.
- Lightly oil both sides and then place on a hot grill or a hot pan. Cook for about 30 seconds on one side and then turn over and cook the same on the other. The cooking time will depend on how thick you have rolled the dough. Place on a wire rack to cool and then get ready to construct your souvlaki.
This article was first published in the print edition of The Saturday Paper on May 31, 2025 as "Homemade lamb souvlaki".
For almost a decade, The Saturday Paper has published Australia’s leading writers and thinkers. We have pursued stories that are ignored elsewhere, covering them with sensitivity and depth. We have done this on refugee policy, on government integrity, on robo-debt, on aged care, on climate change, on the pandemic.
All our journalism is fiercely independent. It relies on the support of readers. By subscribing to The Saturday Paper, you are ensuring that we can continue to produce essential, issue-defining coverage, to dig out stories that take time, to doggedly hold to account politicians and the political class.
There are very few titles that have the freedom and the space to produce journalism like this. In a country with a concentration of media ownership unlike anything else in the world, it is vitally important. Your subscription helps make it possible.
Subscriber exclusive
Send this article to a friend for free.
Share this subscriber exclusive article with a friend or family member using share credits.
