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“But the donair was. It is like Montreal smoked meat or beaver tails in Ottawa; the donair, as a food, belongs to Halifax. So I thought why not make it official.”

This week, Mosher introduced a motion at city council calling for the donair to be recognized as Halifax’s official food. Council voted 12-4 to consider it. Pending further study, at no cost to taxpayers, added Mosher, the donair will soon and forevermore be to Halifax what the Philly Cheesesteak is to Philadelphia.

For the uninitiated, a description: a donair consists of heavily spiced beef cut thin and fresh from a giant loaf of compressed meat that can be seen spinning on vertical rotisseries in fast food joints across Halifax. The meat is wrapped in a thin pita, of Lebanese-descent, and topped with diced tomatoes and raw onions and a sauce so dear and sweet and garlicky that many find it dangerously addictive.

The genius behind this creation was Peter Gamoulakos, a Greek immigrant. Gamoulakos served up his first donair at Velos, a restaurant in Bedford, N.S., before opening King of Donair, his eatery/donair emporium on Quinpool Road, in 1973. What Gamoulakos, since deceased, could not have known then was that he wasn’t simply creating something new, but something essential to the late-night dining experience in Halifax.

Indeed. At its spicy, what-exactly-is-that meat and could you toss in a few extra onions please core, the donair’s gastro appeal is largely rooted in the age and level of sobriety of the individual consuming it. One does not generally grab a donair for Wednesday lunch, but at 2:30 a.m. on a Friday, when the bar lights and beverages of a night out have given way to screaming hunger. Pangs that a pizza slice or a burrito might temper in some Canadian towns, although not in Halifax where, among the brave and the young with the bombproof digestive tracts and a student budget to live on, the donair is viewed as the Tesla of best-eaten-while inebriated foods.