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How_To_Make_Chicken_Shawarma_At_Home
_Chicken_Shawarma_At_Home
_Chicken_Shawarma_At_Home
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00:00Chicken, hold on. How do I say it again? Chicken, shawarma.
00:06Shawarma. Perfect. Say it with me. Chicken.
00:14We'll begin by making our chicken marinade, because this is going to take the longest.
00:17Into a bowl, I'll add some yogurt. That yogurt is going to work to tenderize our chicken.
00:21Then some tomato paste. That'll give us our umami and color. Then I'll grate in three cloves of
00:26garlic. This is going to turn our garlic into a nice paste, and we don't have to go through the
00:30slow pain of mincing it this way. Then we'll add the zest of a whole lemon. Maybe you've heard this
00:34before. Maybe you haven't. But the zest is where we're going to get all that true powerful lemon
00:38flavor. Not so much the juice. Things are starting to smell good in here. But what the juice will help
00:43with is adding in some nice acidity. I almost always prefer lemon juice over vinegar. With that said,
00:48we are going to also add in some white vinegar, just for balance. And then for our dry spices,
00:52we'll add in some ground ginger, some Aleppo pepper flakes, a bit of sugar, just to balance
00:56everything out. A little smoked paprika, my favorite. A pinch of cinnamon, some turmeric.
01:01That'll give us incredible color. The tiniest pinch of allspice, a little coriander, a pinch of cardamom,
01:06a generous pinch of cumin, a little salt. And to finish, I'm going to chop a yellow onion in half
01:11and grate it directly into this mixture. The reason we grate it is to release all of those nice onion
01:16juices. So yes, there's a very good chance this is going to make you cry. But also think on the
01:21bright
01:21side. Are you going to be crying in a little bit when you eat this incredible homemade shawarma?
01:25Probably not. Give this a nice mix. What we've made just now is an absolutely killer marinade for
01:30your chicken. And then optionally, toss on some gloves and add in your chicken. This part's not
01:35optional. I'm using chicken thighs here because later in this video, we're going to mimic that
01:38really hard sear that you'd see from a street vendor serving the same thing. And this will hold
01:42its moisture much better than a chicken breast. All that's left for now with our chicken is to give
01:46this a nice good massage. It's going to smell so good right now that you might want to grab a
01:50piece of
01:50this chicken and taste it raw, but don't do it. Once that's fully mixed, cover it up with plastic
01:54wrap and toss that in the fridge while we finish the rest of our steps. While our chicken marinates,
01:58let's make our first sauce. There are two sauces in this recipe. You don't have to make both,
02:02but I would suggest it. And this one's a little bit more challenging. So that's why I'm going to
02:05start with it. The first one is called tomb. It's the super garlicky creamy sauce. And the main
02:10ingredient is garlic. Along with the garlic, I'm going to add a splash of water and then a little
02:14pinch of salt. And before we do anything else, we're going to blend this up into a fine paste.
02:19If you need to stop it once in a while and sort of scrape down the edges, that's okay.
02:23Just be very, very careful. I feel like I shouldn't have to say this, but don't stick your fingers in
02:27there. Repeat the process of scraping down the sides and moving things around a little bit until
02:32you don't see any large clumps anymore. You should really only need to do this about two or three times.
02:37Great. Now, this is the challenging part. We're going to create something called an emulsion.
02:41And a good example of that is mayonnaise or a vinaigrette. It's basically when you force two things
02:46together that don't really want to be together. So I'll turn this on. And for about the next five
02:50to seven minutes, I'm going to slowly drizzle in a little bit of oil at a time and let the
02:54garlic
02:55take on that oil. And again, this is no different than making mayonnaise, but instead of adding oil
02:59to garlic, you'd be adding it to egg yolks. It's kind of a fun fact, actually. A lot of people
03:03don't
03:03know that mayonnaise is made from just egg yolks and oil. If I take this off and you look at
03:07the
03:07edge, you can see that it's starting to get foamy. This is the very start of what we're going for.
03:11And by the end, this will be smooth and white and fluffy. Give this a little mix. Make sure all
03:15the garlic is getting in there. The reason I'm doing this so incredibly slowly is if you go too
03:19fast, it's going to split. The two things that we're trying to push together, aren't going to
03:23come together. It's a slow and gradual technique, but it's worth that final outcome. My arm's getting
03:27tired. If you want, you can find a really nice angle like this, where you do this slow and gradual
03:33pour. And you can hold at that angle for a while, as long as the sauce doesn't look like it's
03:37all of a
03:37sudden doing something that it's not supposed to. Let's check it again. Ah, see, it's kind of
03:41starting to look like a white soup now, and it's going to continue thickening up, but this is good.
03:45Got to keep going. It's starting to smell really good too. If you close your eyes, you can actually
03:49start to hear it changing in consistency. And that's one of the things that I love so much about
03:53cooking is that it uses all five senses all the time. Watch this. See how it sinks to the middle
03:58now?
03:58It's much slower. You'll see it thicken up more and more as we go. We're almost done. Don't get overly
04:02excited now and dump in all your oil. Don't ruin all your progress. Keep going slow. The garlic
04:07mixture needs to accept the oil. Let's see how high I can go. That's pretty good. That's also the
04:13perfect stream of oil right there. That's about how thick you want it to look when you're pouring.
04:17And it looks like we are at the very end. So check this out. There it is. Now it can
04:23hold on the top
04:24of my rubber spatula. How amazing is that? If you want, you could try adding even more oil to make
04:28this even thicker, but at a certain point, you run the risk of it splitting and not accepting too much
04:33oil. So for me, this is the perfect consistency. The only last thing we need to do to finish it
04:36up
04:36is take a whole lemon, then add it right in there. You got to do this part at the end.
04:40And then one more quick pulse. And that's it. Our tomb is done. At the end there,
04:45the lemon juice thickens it up to the point that it almost now does look like a mayonnaise.
04:49Check out once I add this to a bowl, how thick and fluffy this really is. And then try to
04:53think
04:53back to how this all started. It still blows my mind that this works the way it does.
04:57All we're going to do now is cover this up and then toss it in the fridge to sit there
05:00with our
05:00chicken. Our second and final sauce only takes a few seconds. First, you'll want to get a bit of
05:05really hot water. I've got this fun little boiling water machine because I use it so often. But make
05:09sure whatever water you use for this is nice and hot. And then grab a few garlic cloves and give
05:13them a nice smack. That was the only thing I was using this cute little pen for today. And you
05:17did
05:17a great job. Add that garlic back to your bowl, then pour over that boiling water. And we'll let
05:22this steep, kind of like a garlic tea, for just a few seconds while we prep the rest of our
05:25stuff.
05:26Into a bowl, I'm going to add some tahini. Tahini is literally just blended up sesame seeds,
05:30nothing else. It's a great way to get a super powerful flavor of sesame. Now, lemon. Get all
05:36of that lemon juice into your tahini. Squeeze. And then we'll go in with a little pinch of salt.
05:41And by now, our garlic tea should be done. Oh, that's disgusting. Hold the garlic back and pour
05:47in the water. Ugh, my mouth is going to taste so bad the rest of the day. Then give this
05:51a nice mix
05:51until it's even in consistency. Weirdly, even though it doesn't really make sense, adding water will
05:56actually thicken up your tahini. So all I'm going to do is refill my little garlic tea container and
06:01add a little more water, just bit by bit, until I reach that nice, creamy consistency that I'm
06:05looking for. Suddenly, it goes from this really harsh tasting paste to a nice, light, really creamy
06:10texture. Let's give it a taste. Oh, it's so good. Now, just season to taste. A little more salt. And
06:16once it's perfect, we'll set it at room temperature until we're ready. That's delicious. Our chicken is
06:20marinating. Our sauces are done now. We have to make a very quick and simple salad. Why are we making
06:24a
06:25salad? Well, we have all kinds of richness in the sauce. So this is going to be some nice combination
06:29of acidic, herby, crunchy, and it'll really balance everything out. I'm going to start by chopping up
06:33a few small cucumbers. Next up, we've got some red onion. Same thing. I'm going to chop it up into
06:38some nice small pieces. And you really don't have to take this salad too seriously. If you chop up your
06:42onion and you see any pieces that you still don't like, you can go ahead and give it one last
06:45extra
06:46chop here. Scoop this up into my bowl. Next up, tomatoes. I got them on the vine because they're always
06:51tastier and fresher that way. And I'm feeling to find some of the firmer ones. And then same
06:55thing. I'm just going to chop those up. These are beautiful tomatoes. They're so bright red.
06:59Some people take out the inside piece like this and they just keep the outside.
07:04Usually I leave it, but I'm going to remove them. I don't want it to make my salad all mushy.
07:08And now
07:08I'm just going to chop these up. It's funny how sometimes it's hard, even with a sharp knife,
07:11to cut through the skin of a tomato. So instead, I'll often just flip them over like that. And then
07:15it's easy to slice through. Make sure there's no giant chunks in there. And then in we go.
07:19This is starting to look beautiful, but it would not be complete without some fresh herbs.
07:23Here, I've got parsley. And here, I've got dill. Probably my favorite fresh herb to work with.
07:28For these, I'm just going to pick off the ends. What I'm doing is just sliding my fingers,
07:31almost my nails, all the way down so that I don't hurt or bruise the herbs. Same thing with the
07:36dill.
07:36I'm not measuring. I'm just eyeballing it. But I will tell you this. My grandfather was Persian,
07:40and you really can't make much Middle Eastern cuisine without beautiful fresh herbs. So it's one
07:44of my favorite things to have in the kitchen at home. I mean, honestly, I don't really grow it myself,
07:48but my brother does. I just use it. I'm going to give this a rough chop. I'm being very purposeful
07:51with the knife,
07:52so I don't bruise any of my dill. And same thing with my parsley. It's okay to leave a few
07:55larger
07:56chunks as well. Our salad is going to be perfect either way. We'll gather up those herbs. As you
08:00can see, I'm doing a lot of herbs compared to the vegetables, which I love. Such amazing flavor.
08:05And now, I'm going to finish it off with a little bit of red wine vinegar, a tiny bit of
08:08sugar,
08:09pinch of salt, and finally, just a little bit of olive oil. And before we finish, I'll give it a
08:13quick
08:13stir. Get every little piece that's in here evenly coated. And most salads have a dressing,
08:17but we don't need to make a dressing, especially because we don't want this too wet. Not only do
08:21we not want too much moisture for when we assemble the shawarma at the end, but also it's going to
08:25make its own dressing while it sits there and releases all the juices. I don't even have to
08:30season. This is good. Since we're assembling soon, and I also don't want this to get soggy,
08:34I'm just going to leave it at room temperature right next to our tahini sauce. Last step before
08:37cooking our chicken is to make our French fries. I'm going to add some oil to a small pot and
08:42then get
08:42this going over high heat. I'm not going to make the fries homemade. It's actually really hard to make
08:47fries at home where they stay nice and crispy. And for the shawarma, since we've already made so many
08:51components, I don't feel like we actually have to make our fries homemade. Normally, I like to make
08:55everything homemade, but there's something about these ready to go frozen French fries that I just
08:59love. To finish up our workstation, I'll add a sheet tray lined with a wire rack, as well as a
09:04spider to
09:04scoop my fries out when they're finished. And once our oil has reached the proper temperature, we can
09:08carefully drop in some of our fries. I'm trying to grab all the longer ones because that's going to work
09:12best in our shawarma. Once those are in, I'm going to give them a quick mix to make sure nothing
09:15sticks
09:16together. Always check your oil temperature again once you go to fry anything, because that
09:19temperature is always going to go down when you add something colder to it. And if you're watching
09:23this video and you've decided to make your fries homemade, good for you. That really is awesome,
09:27but I would just say make sure they stay crispy, whatever you do. These really are such an important
09:31component to shawarma, and you need that nice fluffy crunch. Doesn't taste right without it. We're
09:36almost there. They're starting to look nice and golden brown. Certainly looks good. Oh, great crunch and
09:41perfect fluffy interior. These look done now, so I'm going to toss them off to the side. The reason
09:46we have the wire rack is so they can drain off that oil. Listen to that. They're so crispy. You
09:50can
09:50probably even hear the snap of these fries. Listen. Can't forget to hit them right away with a bit of
09:55salt. That's going to stick to the little bit of oil that's still on these fries. We have to build
09:58flavor and seasoning as we go. And now I'll just rest these at room temperature while we cook our
10:02chicken. Stay there. It's time to cook our chicken, but I'm guessing I can probably count on one hand
10:08how many of you watching this video have one of these. The only reason I have one is because I
10:12recently
10:12made a rotisserie chicken for a bear and had to cook in the wilderness. True story. But since I
10:16understand why most people don't have a vertical rotisserie at home, I'm going to show you how to
10:20do it with just a stovetop and a pan. All you do is grab a heavy bottom pan like this.
10:24Can also use
10:25cast iron and add in a generous amount of oil. Enough that you're covering the bottom of your pan. It
10:29might look like a lot of oil, but it's going to allow the oil to climb up into the nooks
10:32and crannies
10:33of the chicken and give extra crust, which means extra char, extra flavor. Let your oil heat over high until
10:38it really starts to shimmer. Then add in your chicken thighs away from you. If you're doing
10:42this right, it's going to be hot, so be careful. I'm leaving plenty of space here between all the
10:46chicken thighs so that they don't steam. We want them to get a nice dark crust and we're also going
10:49to weigh them down with these weights here just so that they get that really nice even hard contact
10:54against the pan. These ones look great. Wow, they've been really pressed down there. And when you start
10:58to feel like you're getting a crust, you can go ahead and flip. Because of the yogurt that's in this
11:02marinade, you might lose a few pieces of the chicken to the pan when you flip it, but it doesn't
11:06matter as long
11:07as you have those nice dark charred spots. Those spots right there are where they're going to mimic
11:11the flavor that we would have gotten by cooking this against an open flame. You can give the pan
11:15a little shake like this and some of the fire might creep up into there, giving you even more flavor.
11:19My chicken is done. I have more char flavor than I could ever want. This is the perfect balance of
11:23tender cooked chicken and char that I'm looking for here. Now that I'm ready to plate, I'm going to pull
11:27all my different components up to my cutting board. Oh yeah, they're still crunchy. Salad, still crunchy.
11:33Traditionally, chicken shawarma would be wrapped in Arabic bread or saj, but I'm going to be using
11:38this. And to finish things up, I'll grab a few pieces of chicken and I'm going to cut these the
11:42long way. So they're nice long strands in there. That's going to be amazing when it comes to the
11:46texture. And as a first layer, I'm going to go right down the center with some tum. Then I'll go
11:50on
11:50with some of my fries. As you can see, I'm layering vertically. It's the only way to do it. Then
11:54my chicken.
11:55Then I'll drain off some of the liquid from my salad here and add on some of that salad. Then
11:59last but not
12:00least, I'll go down the whole thing with some of my tahini sauce. And to finish, a few Lebanese
12:04pickles. And for the grand finale, I'm going to place it down on some parchment and then roll it
12:08on up. And just so all of our hard work doesn't fall apart, I'm going to lightly tie it up.
12:12And that
12:13is how you make chicken shawarma. I wish I took a bite. Why didn't I take a bite? I'm going
12:19to come back in and get it.
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