Desperately Seeking Doner-Kebab

I was at home in New York today, and decided to take in a little taste of Turkey on New York's answer to Devon (or Lawrence, or North, or any of those other streets lined with great food), Queens Boulevard. I found myself in a little cafe called Mangal, where I had something quite exciting: a doner kebab. I like to think of it as an improved gyro--improved, of course, by the red-and-green salad on top, and a creamy sauce (that would probably complement some Belgian fries extremely well). They also had lahmacun, or Turkish pizza, which is actually a sort of small foccacia bread with meat and vegetables on top. Sadly, I was unable to sample this dish, as it's a quite popular fast food both here and in Berlin (my roommate spent a summer there, and claims that doner kebab was invented there). In Canada, I've seen restaurants advertising something called a donair, which I assume is the same thing.

So the question is: where can I find this stuff in Chicago? Or will I have to settle for the local version, a gyro? (there has to be doner in Chicago! there has to be!)

I've never seen doner in a hole-in-the-wall stand like gyros here, but some of the turkish restaurants in the city have it on the menu, including Turkish Cuisine and Bakery in andersonville.

An old chowhound post indicates Anatolia Kebab in Lincoln Square has doner, too, and VI will no doubt chime in.

-ed

I might be mistaken, but i think I remember seeing it on the menu at Old Jerusalem on Wells.

I have never really seen here the kind of doner stand one sees in Germany run by the "guest workers" form Turkey. However, I must say that the Pakistani cabbie joints have nan-based sandwiches that are similar, but better, than any doner I've had. Even Greektown's Kebab Corner, which expands its menu to please some African and Middle Eastern customers, serves a shwarma sammy that comes close to what you are looking for. It can be very good depending on whether you get the made-to-order bread and wat the meat on the spit is like when you visit.

PS, speaking broadly of such food, I just received my first bit of helpful information from Check Please. A recent episode had the diners at Maza, the overdone-looking Lebanese place on Lincoln. I've never been, as it always seemed a bit too polished to me. However, I was struck by the image of what looked like outstanding kibbeh nayeh. Has anyone tried this relatively rare-in-Chicago dish at Maza?

JeffB wrote:I have never really seen here the kind of doner stand one sees in Germany run by the "guest workers" form Turkey. However, I must say that the Pakistani cabbie joints have nan-based sandwiches that are similar, but better, than any doner I've had. Even Greektown's Kebab Corner, which expands its menu to please some African and Middle Eastern customers, serves a shwarma sammy that comes close to what you are looking for. It can be very good depending on whether you get the made-to-order bread and wat the meat on the spit is like when you visit.

PS, speaking broadly of such food, I just received my first bit of helpful information from Check Please. A recent episode had the diners at Maza, the overdone-looking Lebanese place on Lincoln. I've never been, as it always seemed a bit too polished to me. However, I was struck by the image of what looked like outstanding kibbeh nayeh. Has anyone tried this relatively rare-in-Chicago dish at Maza?

Really? I've never had anything at a cabbie place that seemed like donor kebab.

I've told my Cardiff donor story before, but the bottom line is, I too have never found anything like it here. Yes, it's gyros, but the flavoring of the ground meat was different, and the garnish was really different: cabbage and hot sauce (Louisiana) and tons of salt. It is a treat, 20 odd years later, I still rememeber and still would love (too) to duplicate.

Rob

Well, I have not had the pleasure of an English version of a doner kebab, but my recollection of the Turkish stands in Frankfurt, for example, is pretty close to a lamb shwarma, particularly the souped-up version at kebab corner. I don't want to make hasty generalizations, seeing as these are foods from countries that do not so much as share a border, but for me, sandwiches from the Devon BBQ places (even Kababish) present a reasonable alternative to a doner kebab (particularly if you are looking to replace a "chicken doner" which may or may not be a real Turkish sandwich, but are sold by Turks in Germany).

Reagrding the differences between a lamb shwarma and a doner, here's an interesting British link.

http://www.btinternet.com/~doner.ride/battle.htm

PS, the British site makes me think that what they call doner, we in Chicago would call gyros, particularly the GyroKone gyros of Kronos.

PPS, it seems that in Turkey the gyro-like, bound doner cone is a subgenre that has taken hold in the UK. (Look at the bottom of the linked page for Cag Kebabi.) This is not what I had in Germany, though I don't doubt that it is there. Perhaps it depends on where the Turks came from. In any event, it looks like doner has a particular meaning in the UK that is closer to a gyro than to a shawerma. All of that said, I agree that I've not seen the ground and bound version in Chicago. But Greektown might be a good place to get close.

http://www.allaboutturkey.com/mutfak.htm#doner[/url]

Evan, Cafe Demir at 2964 N. Lincoln does a doner kebab and lahmacun (as well as adana and ezme). I've been happy with all the lamb dishes I've tried, but less so with the chicken. It's my current favorite among the Turkish restaurants on a couple mile patch of Lincoln. Try it and let me know how it compares to the ones you had in Germany.

I have fond memories of eating <i>doener kebab</i> at 3am on a miscellaneous Viennese street. And IMHO, Vienna beats berliner kebabs any day. Yes, <i>doeners</i>, as the Germans and Austrians call them, were prolly invented in Berlin (specifically in the predominantly-Turkish Kreuzberg district). However, you can find them in Turkey, especially in touristy destinations, which translates into any place that is popular with camera-wielding Germans. But regardless, the major difference between the Viennese and berliner varieties is that for the former they generally lack the curry ketchup and sometimes pink spicy sauce that drenches berliner doeners. In fact, I would say that the Viennese snack on a dish that is more Turkish in composition and taste than Berlin's alternative (if only by one ingredient). Of course, the <i>joghurt</i> and bread envelopes are more Central European than they are Anatolian, but then Turkish flat bread is not too different.

Anyway, I have tried and tried to find doeners in Chicago, and this post is certainly a refreshing read! I will have to venture through the places listed herein. I'd be ecstatic to find even a distant trace of those Halcyon days!

BTW, if you want to replicate a Germanic doener on-the-fly, pick up some soft, light Turkish flat bread ("pide", roughly equivalent to the width of two hands, placed side-by-side), slice it open and stuff it with your favorite paki/middle-eastern/persi spiced meat (I take to the hunter paratha meat at Ghareeb Nawaz, it comes pretty close to Viennese doener meat), then add joghurt and your fave tarator sauce (go light on the tarator), sambal olek (or any red, partially blended chilli sauce), tomato, onions and lettuce.

Oh, and for you doener fans out there, here's a little slice of heaven:

http://www.doener365.de

During my sojourn to Bavaria this summer to watch the World Cup, I feasted on a Doner Kebab at 3 a.m. in Mannheim. Meh. I'll take a gyro from a million places here any day.

Although the Fanta was outstanding....

chitrader wrote:During my sojourn to Bavaria this summer to watch the World Cup, I feasted on a Doner Kebab at 3 a.m. in Mannheim. Meh. I'll take a gyro from a million places here any day.

Although the Fanta was outstanding....

I was in Germany in September, just in time for the big Gammelfleisch scandal. Apparently, an organised crime group based in Munich, I think, had been buying up old, nasty meat to sell to the döner-kebab joints. They got busted and one of the heads of the ring did himself in.

Antonius

Antonius wrote:I was in Germany in September, just in time for the big Gammelfleisch scandal. Apparently, an organised crime group based in Munich, I think, had been buying up old, nasty meat to sell to the döner-kebab joints. They got busted and one of the heads of the ring did himself in.

theparliament.com - ‘Gammelfleisch skandal’ hits EU

Ha! I have to confess that I did get food-poisoning once in one of my countless doener munching sessions in Vienna. It was somewhere in the 6th or 7th districts, can't remember which, at one of the city's numerous markets.

chitrader wrote:During my sojourn to Bavaria this summer to watch the World Cup, I feasted on a Doner Kebab at 3 a.m. in Mannheim. Meh. I'll take a gyro from a million places here any day.

Although the Fanta was outstanding....

Doner Kebabs are all over the place, but the best doners I've had I prefer to the best gyros I've had (I'm actually not much of a gyros eater myself, but love doners).

However, the nomenclature doesn't seem to be consistent at all. I've had doners that were indistinguishable from shwarma; I've had doners that were served on freshly-baked seed-encrusted flatbread served with an array of sauces (one yogurt and tahini-based, another hot pepper based. I never noticed any containing curry ketchup, but my favorite doners were had in Berlin); Budapest's Turkish community (as evidenced by the ubiquitous Három Testvér stands in the city) had a burrito-like take on it. Rather than wrapping the meat (almost always veal or turkey) in pita bread, it was wrapped in what looked exactly like a flour tortilla. The bottom side was folded over, and the top side of the doner was open-ended. Pita-based versions could be found, too, but the flour tortilla version was at least as common. I haven't seen this type of doner anywhere else, and it's a nice change of pace, being much lighter than the typical pita-based one.

If I had to strictly define a doner kebab, I'd be hard-pressed to do so. I always thought they were just another name for schwarma, but apparently there's a difference, given the link provided.

Antonius wrote:

chitrader wrote:During my sojourn to Bavaria this summer to watch the World Cup, I feasted on a Doner Kebab at 3 a.m. in Mannheim. Meh. I'll take a gyro from a million places here any day.

Although the Fanta was outstanding....

I was in Germany in September, just in time for the big Gammelfleisch scandal. Apparently, an organised crime group based in Munich, I think, had been buying up old, nasty meat to sell to the döner-kebab joints. They got busted and one of the heads of the ring did himself in.

Antonius

That may explain my lack of enthusiasm!