Shawarma is a middle-eastern dish that has been integrated into mainstream street food culture to the extent that chefs have begun to create their own recipes and versions of the ethnic dish. While you can enjoy this at a street store near you, you can also easily make it in the comfort of your own home.
Shawarma can be made with just about any meat from lamb, chicken to turkey and you have the liberty to play around with vegetable fillings as you choose to have, a mini-salad combo, (some fast-food restaurants offer mango slices).
While getting the ingredients for the shawarma is easy, it is quite amusing that most people forget about the shawarma sauce when it is literally the ingredient that brings it all together for an amazing culinary experience. It is almost impossible to enjoy delicious shawarma without taking note of that signature creamy sauce that gets interwoven with the vegetable fillings and meat –a taste you get with each bite.
This tasty sauce is made from a base of thick yogurt, garlic, lemon juice, and some salt –which explains its savory taste. There are some people who choose to add mayonnaise in the making of their shawarma sauce, but that’s entirely optional (you can add to taste). While it is essentially used in making shawarma dishes, if you have excess you can store it up in your fridge and use it as a dip, in sandwiches or for salad dressings –it is a very versatile sauce!
To make shawarma sauce for 3-4 shawarmas, you will need:
- ½cup of Greek yogurt (optional: sour-cream can)
- ½ medium-sized lime, juiced
- garlic cloves, minced
- 2 tablespoons of fresh dill, chopped (optional: 1 teaspoon dry dill)
- ¼ teaspoon of salt, or to taste
- Additional, based on preference: 1 tablespoon Tahini, 5 mint leaves (fresh or dry).
You can either place all the ingredients in a blender/ electric whisk and process for a minute, until smoothly mixed, pour into a container and store in your fridge till use, or manually mix them in a bowl with a hand-held whisk or mixing spoon and proceed to store when thoroughly mixed and fluffy.
For a larger amount, you can multiply the above-listed ingredients to suit your taste and if you have a preference for hot spice, you can add some sriracha sauce to the mixture or pour in dried chili pepper to taste.
The beauty of shawarma sauce lies in the best thing about shawarma itself, it is very flexible. You can experiment with different flavors and spices to switch up your taste and make your shawarma more exciting!