This Gyroscope-Style Casserole Is Perfect for Drunkards
Hello and welcome back to Will It Casserole? , a column in which I take your delicious concepts and reintroduce them as delicious casserole creations. We’re making one hot dish this week, inspired by a deliciously brilliant comment from a reader:
It was, as I explained to TMoRB, not at all useless. I spent a semester in Italy as a 19-year-old villain, and after thinking that I have many wonderful food memories, drunken use of gyroscopes at four in the morning is probably the most intuitive. (Oddly enough, the Italian word for “bow” and the Italian word for “horses” are very similar. Guess which one I always ordered?)
I love these things anyway, and the gyroscope-inspired hot dish sounded like the perfect casserole for the drunk (or the strong, or the very, very hungry). Ready-made gyro meat is pretty tricky to find – and it’s not that good unless it’s just carved out of a rotating cone – so I used a mixture of seasoned lamb and chicken instead. To make this stack delicious, you will need:
- 6 cloves of garlic
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2 teaspoons of cumin
- 1 teaspoon ground oregano
- 1 teaspoon pepper
- 450 g dark chicken, cut into small pieces
- 4 loin lamb, boneless and cut into small pieces
- Olive oil
- Half a lemon, halved (total, 2 quarters lemon)
- 1 bag of 2 lb. frozen fries (or about 2 lb. fries ordered from your favorite french fries supplier)
- 12 ounces chopped feta, divided into two servings
- 1 medium onion, thinly sliced and halved
- 2 tablespoons butter
- 2 tablespoons flour
- 1 1/2 cups chicken stock
- 2 large handfuls of pita bread, chopped and doused with olive oil to coat
- 1 small cucumber, thinly sliced
- 1 pint cherry tomatoes, halved
- 1/4 head of iceberg lettuce, minced
- T zatsiki sauce
Peel the garlic cloves and salt them liberally before chopping. Combine minced garlic with cumin, ground oregano and puree using a mortar and pestle.
Divide this great grated sauce in half and grate half on chicken and half on lamb. Fry the chicken in a non-stick skillet over high heat in a few drops of olive oil until tender and brown, transfer to the skillet juice bowl.
Cook the lamb in the same skillet, adding a little more olive oil until the pink is gone from the outside of the meat. Transfer to a bowl of chicken. Cook the fries according to the directions on the package and until they are nice and crispy, chop all the vegetables.
When the potatoes are ready, place the lamb on the first layer, then the onion and half of the feta.
Repeat with the chicken, finishing with a layer of feta. Be sure to reserve the meat juices from the bowl.
Season with two tablespoons of butter and two tablespoons of flour until golden brown and the smell of raw flour disappears. Add chicken stock and stir until gravy is obtained. Stir in the juice, let it thicken slightly, and pour over the casserole. Place the whole thing in a 375-degree oven for 20 minutes, until the feta begins to brown. Sprinkle with butter-seasoned pita chips and return to oven for another five minutes.
Arrange vegetables, drizzle with tzatziki and eat.
Marvel at how the resulting pile of food sits somewhere between gyroscope, disco fries, and salad, and make plans to prepare most of the ingredients before your next big party so you can drunkenly collect and eat them. If, however, you plan on taking this dish to a party or something and won’t serve it right away, serve raw vegetables on the side and let everyone add their own.