Make your own Greek gyro meat at home with this gyro meat recipe. It's so simple to make, but it is authentic and turns out delicious. If you've ever wanted to make restaurant-style gyros at a home, you've found the best gyro meat recipe ever.

Best of all? it's very easy. I will show you how to make Instant Pot Gyros or Gyro meat in the oven.

Jump to: Why Is this Gyro Meat So Good?

Greek Gyro Meat Recipe

How To Make Gyro Meat at Home

What Kind of Meat is used for Gyro Meat?

Can I make Gyros in the Instant Pot?

Gyro Meat Recipe

Why Is this Gyro Meat So Good?

Easy. Use your stand mixer to make it in a snap.

Use your stand mixer to make it in a snap. Delicious. Who doesn't love a Greek Gyro?

Who doesn't love a Greek Gyro? Low Carb. This gyro meat is only 2 carbs per serving.

This gyro meat is only 2 carbs per serving. Fast. Forget using a rotisserie with my method.

Greek Gyro Meat Recipe

I absolutely love gyros. Nothing makes me happier than walking down Manhattan with a big huge gyro dripping tzatziki sauce all over my suit.

But here's the thing.

I don't live in Manhattan. I live in a little suburb in Texas.

If I wanted to find authentic gyro meat near me? I would be driving about 30 miles round trip. Yeah, not happening.

So I decided I would just try to make my own gyro recipe at home.

Several hours of internet research ensued and as usual, many of the other recipes out there were too complicated for me.

So I simplified and now we have this crazy easy recipe that tastes just like authentic Greek gyro meat--but I warn you, it's not made authentically.

How is Gyro Meat Made?

The word gyro (pronounced yee-roh) means to turn. If you wanted to follow an authentic Greek recipe for this, well the first thing you'd have to do is invest in a ginormous upright rotisserie grill.

Normally you'd have a large cone of meat that had been cooked on a spit, and turned frequently. It would take hours from start to finish.

Oh, and you'd probably also end up with about 50 lbs of meat sitting around because that's how big those rotisserie thingies are.

So yeah. Take my advice. Go for authentic gyro taste, not for the authentic way to actually MAKE the best gyro meat at home.

How To Make Gyro Meat at Home

Place onion and garlic in a food processor

2. Puree well. If you don't want to dirty a food processor, either chop then really finely, or grate the onion.

3. Place ground meat, onions, garlic, and spices in a stand mixer. If you don't have a stand mixer, it's okay. Either use a hand mixer, or just beat the heck out of the mixture with a wooden spoon.

4. Mix well. This step is very important. Either use a hand mixer, a stand mixer--or your hands. But you want to get a sticky, pasty consistency to the meat. If you don't do that, you won't really have a loaf. You will have hamburgers.



What we are doing with this paddling is trying to extract protein. You know when the protein extraction has begun because the meat starts to become a sticky mess.

Why do we want to do this?

Well, Protein Extraction allows the protein in the meat to better encapsulate the fat, and hold water and fat together. This allows the protein and water to become best buddies, and stick close together, keeping you from having a watery, or fatty mess. This results in a better final product, with a smoother mouthfeel. It also helps you slice the finished product a lot more easily.

5. Put the sticky meat mixture in a baking pan and smooth and smoosh in as much as you can.

6. Once it is baked, place it on foil sheets.

7. Make a nice tight wrap of that loaf.

8. Weight it down and let it rest. You are doing this to allow the meat to become as close to a traditional gyro cone as you can. This is not an optional step if you want a dense, gyro-like loaf.

And there you are! Luscious, easy, fragrant, homemade gyro meat.

Tips and Tricks for getting the Best Beef Gyros and Gyro Meat at home

Use any kind of relatively fatty ground meat like beef, lamb, pork, or a combination. If you use chicken or turkey, you may have a drier, leaner result. Paddle the living daylights out of that mixture. Let me tell you--it's all in the paddling of that meat. Without this, you just have a meatloaf texture. Paddling matters! Read the article above for the process of protein extraction, and why it matters. Put it into a loaf pan and cook it. Then you want to weight down that cooked loaf. This is not the time for a shortcut. Put a heavy object on that loaf, like a skillet or two cans of beans, and let it get quite thoroughly smooshed so that your homemade gyro meat has the same texture as the restaurant gyro meat does. This meat freezes well if properly wrapped. I suggest you leave the leftovers in a loaf, wrap well with foil, and then put into a plastic ziptop bag. Alternatively, you can use a FoodSaver (see my FoodSaver review here).

What Kind of Meat is used for Gyro Meat?

Traditionally, these are made with lamb meat, or lamb and beef.

I have one son who refuses to eat lamb because "They're too cute to eat."

So at our house, the homemade gyros are usually made with either ground beef, or a combination of pork and ground beef.

I totally get that it's close to heresy to make a middle-eastern dish eaten originally by Muslims and Jews using Pork. I do, I get it! But if I want my son to eat any of it? No lamb gyros.

So you can make lamb gyros, ground beef gyros, or pork gyros, or lamb and beef gyros, and they will all taste delicious.

Honestly, I just buy whatever in on sale.

I would stay away from extra lean meats like ground chicken or turkey for this dish. You need a good marbling of fat in whatever ground meat you use to make gyros.

Have some leftover ground pork from making this recipe? Make my Keto Pork Stir Fry!

Are Gyros Keto?

Well, they CAN be. But not if you eat the pita bread and make a gyro sandwich with it.

What I like about gyros is that you can make the gyro meat at home, and then the keto folks can eat the meat with a few other side dishes, while the non keto family members can chow down the meat with the pita.

I'm okay with that. They are going to be SO FULL with that bread, they won't be able to eat much of the gyro meat.

Which means more for me! Woohoo!

Gyros And More

Serve this gyro meat recipe with homemade Tzatziki sauce,

You can serve with my 5-minute hummus .

. You could add baba ghanoush .

. There's also a Greek "Pizza" recipe with the leftover meat --if you have any.

Want To Make A Gyro Sandwich?

Throw some of this great gyro meat in a pita and top with tzatziki sauce. You'll have gyros to go.

Can I make Gyros in the Instant Pot?

Absolutely you can. Here's a well-loved Instant Pot Gyro Recipe for you. All the taste, none of the heat from the oven ruining your day.

I've seen many Instant Pot Recipes for Gyros that use sliced meat and they just really don't seem that authentic to me, so I use the same technique as below to form the gyro loaf, but then I cook it in the Instant Pot.

And if you're looking for more great Instant Pot recipes, check out my 20 Best Instant Pot Recipes post!

So use either the oven, or the Instant Pot, and enjoy your homemade gyro meat recipe! If you love this recipe as much as I do, share this recipe with your friends on Facebook or Pin it to make again later.

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Gyro Meat Recipe Make doner kababs or gyros at home, with this gyro meat recipe. This gyro meat recipe is so simple to make, but it authentic and turns out delicious. If you've ever wanted to make restaurant-style gyro meat at a home, you've found the best gyro meat recipe ever. Print Recipe Pin Recipe Prep Time: 10 minutes Cook Time: 1 hour Total Time: 1 hour 10 minutes Servings: 8 Calories: 236 kcal Author: Urvashi Pitre Click on highlighted ingredients or Equipment to see exactly what I use to make this recipe Equipment Instant Pot

KITCHENAID STAND MIXER

KITCHEN AID HAND MIXER

WOODEN SPOONS Ingredients 1 pound (0.45 kg) Lean Ground Beef 1 pound ( 0.45 kg ) Lean Ground Beef

1 pound (0.45 kg) ground pork , or ground lamb 1 pound ( 0.45 kg ) ground pork , or ground lamb

, 1 (1 ) Red Onion. chopped, rough chopped 1 ( 1 ) Red Onion. chopped rough chopped

6 cloves (6 cloves) Garlic 6 cloves ( 6 cloves ) Garlic

2 teaspoons (2 teaspoons) Ground Marjoram 2 teaspoons ( 2 teaspoons ) Ground Marjoram

2 teaspoons (2 teaspoons) dried rosemary 2 teaspoons ( 2 teaspoons ) dried rosemary

2 teaspoons (2 teaspoons) Dried Oregano 2 teaspoons ( 2 teaspoons ) Dried Oregano

2 teaspoons (2 teaspoons) Kosher Salt 2 teaspoons ( 2 teaspoons ) Kosher Salt

2 teaspoons (2 teaspoons) Ground Black Pepper 2 teaspoons ( 2 teaspoons ) Ground Black Pepper Instructions Place onions, garlic into a large food processor and process until finely chopped but not liquefied.

Add meat and all the seasonings and grind for another 3-5 minutes. Do not skip this step. If you do, it will be like ground beef with some weird seasonings in it. Grind it until it's a big, huge, sticky mess that you wonder how you will ever clean up.

Since writing this recipe I've discovered a faster way to do this, which is to use your stand mixer with the paddle. Paddle the living daylights out of the meat with the spices until it's a sticky mess. This is a lot easier to clean up than a blender, and the end result is the same. So use whatever you have that works for you.

Put into a foil pan, and smooth out the top, and bake at 350 for 60 mins, or until it reaches an internal temperature of 175-180

Take it out of the oven and drain all the fat.

Cover it with foil and then place something heavy on it to compress it. I put a cast iron skillet on top and then carefully placed 3 cans of beans on top of the skillet to compress it.

Let it rest for 30 mins and then slice into thin slices.

Gyros! Watch The Video I think the final fat content and calories are lower because I ended up draining out at least half a cup of fat, but I don't know how to account for that in the macros. Use any kind of relatively fatty ground meat like beef, lamb, pork, or a combination. If you use chicken or turkey, you may have a drier, leaner result. Paddle the living daylights out of that mixture. Let me tell you--it's all in the paddling of that meat. Without this, you just have a meatloaf texture. Paddling matters! Read the article above for the process of protein extraction, and why it matters. Put it into a loaf pan and cook it. Then you want to weight down that cooked loaf. This is not the time for a shortcut. Put a heavy object on that loaf, like a skillet or two cans of beans, and let it get quite thoroughly smooshed so that your homemade gyro meat has the same texture as the restaurant gyro meat does. This meat freezes well if properly wrapped. I suggest you leave the leftovers in a loaf, wrap well with foil, and then put into a plastic ziptop bag. Alternatively, you can use a FoodSaver (see my FoodSaver review here). Serve with tzatziki, hummus, baba ghanoush, and/or pita. Get support & connect with our community on Facebook! Cooking Group Keto Group Nutrition Calories: 236 kcal | Carbohydrates: 2 g | Protein: 22 g | Fat: 15 g Tried this recipe? Follow @twosleevers and Pin it!

Don't forget to check out my other Keto cookbooks.

Keto Instant Pot, Keto Fat Bombs, Sweets, & Treats, and Easy keto in 30 minutes.