A while back I wrote about the Greek Salad Gyro Plate I enjoyed with my mom and sisters — a lunchtime meal that lodged in my memory as pure perfection.
It was a salad (and we all know how I feel about salads), but it was far more than a side dish. The plate was huge, piled with crisp romaine, fresh cherry tomatoes, thick cucumber slices, briny kalamata olives, crumbled feta, a mound of crispy gyro meat, and a small ramekin of Greek dressing on the side. I was over the moon.
Although my companions were vegetarian, they shared a couple of their dolmades (stuffed grape leaves) with me, and those belonged on that salad — a delightful addition.
When I decided to recreate that plate at home, I knew dolmades would be part of my version. I didn’t make them from scratch because I didn’t have the ingredients on hand, and I wasn’t motivated to hunt them down when a nearby market’s Mediterranean bar sells excellent dolmades and other salad accoutrements inexpensively.
If you have a grandmother who makes them for you or you have the ingredients and time to make them yourself, go for it — they’re worth it.
If you’ve already prepared gyro meat at home, you’re only minutes away from assembling this salad: wash and dry your lettuce, slice the cucumber, and you’re ready.
This salad is something you’ll want right away. Even if you don’t have gyro meat, leftover roasted or grilled chicken, pork, or beef are suitable substitutes, but the gyro meat really makes the dish sing.
The Greek Salad Gyro Plate is a full meal — not a side salad. Add plenty of pita wedges to mop up dressing and feta, and no one will leave hungry. A fair warning: save enough for lunch the next day, because you’ll be thinking about it until you have a second helping.
If main-dish salads appeal to you, other favorites include Bo Luc Lac (Vietnamese Shaking Beef Salad), Cheeseburger Salad, Greek Salad, Pizza Salad, Tex-Mex Cobb Salad, Spicy Southwestern Chicken Salad (meal prep bowls), and Blackened Salmon Caesar Salad.
Greek Salad Gyro Plate
The restaurant version I had used romaine for a satisfying crunch, so I recommend making romaine the bulk of the greens. You can add spring mix, butter lettuce, or pea shoots for variety, but make sure at least half of the greens are romaine.
If you prefer, slice the cherry tomatoes so they don’t roll around on the plate, but I enjoy the burst of a whole cherry tomato and don’t mind chasing them with a fork.
I skipped raw onion this time; red and sweet onions can be quite sharp in certain seasons. If you find a mild, sweet onion, thin slices would be a nice addition.
I serve the dressing on the side and recommend dressing individual portions just before eating. Pre-dressing the whole salad tends to make it limp.
Greek Salad Gyro Plate {restaurant diy}
Rebecca Lindamood
Ingredients
Per Salad:
- 4-6 cups mixed salad greens mostly romaine
- 10-12 slices gyro meat prepared as for gyros
- 1/2 of an English cucumber seedless, sliced into 1/4-inch thick rounds
- 1/2 cup small cherry tomatoes or chopped seeded tomatoes
- 1/4 cup pitted kalamata olives and/or feta stuffed olives
- 1/8 to 1/4 cup crumbled feta cheese
- 2-3 dolmades stuffed grape leaves
- Greek Salad Dressing
Instructions
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Place the salad greens in a large bowl or on a large plate. Arrange the cherry tomatoes, sliced cucumbers, and olives in rows on the greens. Crumble feta over everything, then pile the prepared gyro meat on one corner of the salad. Serve with Greek dressing on the side and dress just before eating.
Nutritional information is an estimate and provided as a courtesy. Calculate nutrition using the specific ingredients you use with your preferred calculator.
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This post originally published March 31st, 2014.