I had to do a double check to make sure I hadn’t posted this one yet. This is a dinner that we’ve eaten pretty much every other week for the past 3 years, and still never tire of it! It’s relatively quick and easy dinner too, that doesn’t heat up the whole house. My husband grew up working in Greek family restaurants, so he’s always loved gyros. I stayed away from them for a long time, due the flat grey meat that is usually lurking inside. Then, my favorite internet Greek resident, Elly, shared her recipe for chicken gyros. It was like a revelation! I made them once years ago, and our whole family has been loving them since.
The chicken is marinated in lemon juice, olive oil, garlic, and oregano. Then grilled, sliced, and piled into a warm pita with plenty of cool, creamy tzatziki and fresh veggies of your choosing. I like lettuce, tomato, sliced cucumber, and red onion. Perfect for an evening dinner outside in the backyard, which we love to enjoy this time of year. I usually to a Greek seasoned oven fry with them, but with the abundance of gorgeous tomatoes in my backyard right now I decided to make a cucumber tomato feta salad. Amazeballs! If you haven’t made this Greek favorite already, just go ahead and do so. I can say with certainty that it will probably go onto heavy menu rotation on your dinner menus!
Chicken Gyros
1 lb boneless, skinless chicken (breasts or thighs)
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 lemon, juiced
2 tsp red wine vinegar
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tsp dried oregano
kosher salt and pepper
1 batch tzatziki sauce
sliced tomatoes
sliced onions
sliced cucumbers
lettuce
4 (pocketless) pitas
Whisk together the garlic, lemon juice, vinegar, oil, oregano, and 1 teaspoon salt in a small bowl and add to Ziploc bag. Add in chicken pieces and marinate in the refrigerator for 1 hour, turning halfway through.
Preheat the grill (or pan, or broiler). Sprinkle the chicken with salt and pepper on both sides, and then grill over indirect heat until cooked through, about 8 minutes per side, depending what size/type chicken you are using. Allow the chicken to rest for a few minutes before slicing into strips.
Meanwhile, warm your pita bread. I have a gas stove, so I just spray them with a little bit of oil and stick them right on the burner for a few seconds per side. Top the pita with the chicken, tzatziki, tomatoes, cucumbers, onions, and lettuce.
Souce: slightly adapted from Elly Says Opa!
41 Comments
These look wonderful-perfect to eat when it’s hot outside.
My husband always drags me to Greek festivals and I’m so disgusted by that grey meat! YUCK! However, your gyros look awesome and I can’t wait to make them for him!
I love Gyros – enjoy the fact that this is so easy to do, yum
Glad to hear these are a regular in your house! I really, really need to update my pic at some point. Hah.
Do you think I could sub greek yogurt? would you still need to strain the yogurt?
Makila – of course you can! And no, no straining is necessary.
Where can I get good pits breads, the ones at store are so flat and tasteless. Any ideas?
Barb, I make my own. It’s much easier than you’d think! Here’s my recipe: http://tideandthyme.com/diy-pita-bread/
I am having an aversion to meat handling these days so debated about making these but decided to use ground chicken so I just slipped the ground meat into the baggie to marinate – no touching! I haven’t eaten yet since it’s not quite dinnertime but looking forward to it! I have just started following your blog and love all the recipe ideas as I seem to be in a slump lately when it comes to dinner prep. Thanks!
This was great, and easy. I did all my prep the night before, it only took 20 min to of cook time.
I cut my chicken and put in a container, mixed it threw the day and cook in oven on 500 for 20 min on parchment paper. When done, threw it on stove to seer (?) the meat, turned oven off and threw 6 pita in oven to warm. It worked great for me.
Made this tonight and it turned out great. I followed your recipe almost exactly except that I did not make my own pitas. It was a big hit! Thanks!
Do you use Greek yogurt or regular yogurt?
Elaine, I use Greek yogurt – or you could buy regular plain yogurt and strain it yourself using a coffee filter.
Found this on Pinterest and had to try it…Delish!!! Thanks!!!
Does anyone happen to know the nutrition info on the chicken gyros?
Sorry, but I sure don’t. Should be fairly easy to calculate using a tool like this, though: http://recipes.sparkpeople.com/recipe-calculator.asp
We featured this recipe on our FB page
We think it’s great!!
I was just wondering if you have shared the recipe for the salad in the picture? It looks delicious!
Sandy, I haven’t yet. Hopefully this summer! Was basically tomatoes, cucumbers, red onion and feta. Tossed with a bit of red wine vinaigrette! Easy peasy, but oh so good. Now I need summertime
Me too!
I found you on Pinterest
Do you think this would work as a freezer meal? If I put the chicken breast in with seasonings and then froze to cook later?
Where the marinade is so acidic, I would probably advise against doing that. I think you’d end up with chicken ceviche when you defrosted it. You could always marinade and cook the chicken, then refrigerate or freeze the chicken to use later in the week when you were short on time. The tzatziki can be made a day in advance, but would not work in the freezer.
You mention Greek seasoned oven fries. What’s your method for making those? Can’t wait to try this meal!
I use this basic recipe for method, but add a couple of cloves of minced garlic and some dried oregano before baking.
I am soooo happy to have found your page through Pinerest.com (gotta love that site!). I am going to prepare a “Day From Home” Sunday for my husband’s Valentine’s gift on the 17th. He is from Cyprus and is SEVERELY missing home. I thought a full day of food and music (maybe some smells) would help. Your homemade pitas, chicken gyros and baked fries shall do the trick for lunch!
Thanks for helping me make my hubby happy
I made this for my husband’s family this weekend while they were in town. Everybody raved about it, especially the chicken. They kept passing the plate of sliced chicken around to nibble on after they’d had their gyros. I’ll definitely be keeping this recipe around. Thanks!
Can I have your recipe for Tzatziki sauce too? I am looking for one…
thanks!
Jen – here you go: http://tideandthyme.com/tzatziki/
I made a Greek salad earlier this week so I “cheated” and stuffed that into pitas. My husband did, however, make the Tzatziki from the recipe you offered. Oh my heavens, it was good! I suggest that people make half or even one quarter of it unless they want a lot left over for other uses. Thanks for the recipes!
I usually end up snacking on it with pita chips the next day, but the recipe would be fine if you halved it too. Glad you enjoyed it!
Made the gyros and tzatziki and loved them both. Even my little ones enjoyed.
Can’t wait to try these! Going to make them tomorrow!!!
These look awesome!
What’s the side dish?
It was a simple tomato, cucumber, and onion salad with feta. Looking forward to blogging it in another month or so when tomatoes are getting in season!
Found on Pinterest
Would I be able to cook the chicken in the marinade in the crockpot, then shred it instead of slice it? I have an aversion to handling raw chicken and prefer not to as much as possible, and really love shredded chicken. Just not sure if it would work with this… Thanks!
Nicole, the marinade is kind of acidic to be preparing it in a crockpot for hours. I’d just do it the way you normally cook chicken in the Crockpot, maybe add a little lemon pepper seasoning and oregano? Then use that! When toppped with the tzatziki, I’m sure it will be delicious!
Just made this for dinner and it was a huge hit! I also used your recipes for tzaziki sauce and pita bread and just blew my parents away. served it with Greek salad. The chicken was super moist and flavorful, the tzaziki sauce was awesome (even though I used fat-free greek yogurt) and the pitas were crazy puffy and delicious. Thanks for posting this!
That’s so awesome. Thanks for coming back to comment!
I made this for our dinner tonight. Used Naan bread instead of pocketless pita bread (could only find pocketless pita bread with soy flour in it and I can’t have that, thus naan was the delicious alternative), omitted the fresh onion (we don’t care for raw onion), sliced the meat before marinating it, then sautéed the meat instead of grilling it. Added some crumbled feta to it when assembled. Made 1/4 to 1/3 the amount of tzatziki sauce and it was enough to cover 4 naan breads for the four of us. DEFINITELY will make this again!! Thank you for sharing!!
Hi! I found your recipe on pinterest and cooked it for my half greek boyfriend tonight. We both loved it
Thank´s so much!
I absolutely love gyros and never thought of making my own before until I saw this recipe. The marinade for the chicken is perfect, it is so flavorful. In a pinch, Trader Joes has a really delicious tzatziki in the prepared foods section. I just give it a squeeze of lemon and even my grandmother, who is 100% Greek, approves.
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[...] Recipe adapted from Tide and Thyme. [...]