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Is A Shish Kebab Healthier Than A Doner Kebab? 

kebabs in pitta bread

Is A Shish Kebab Healthier Than A Doner Kebab? 

When you have a craving for a kebab, picking the healthy option probably isn’t the first thing that comes to mind. However, if you’re someone who finds themselves visiting the local kebab shop a little more often than you should, it’s good to be aware of the different options available and how they stack up when it comes to calories and carbs.

The two main options you’ll always see when you go to any kebab shop are the Doner Kebab and the Shish Kebab. Other places might also do Shawarma or Gyros too, but let’s keep things simple and focus on the differences between shish and doner kebabs. 

Doner Kebab 

A donner kebab is probably what you picture in your mind when someone suggests getting a kebab. Thin slices of meat stacked on top of each other, then cooked on a rotisserie. This is the big cone of meat that you see rotating behind the counter of every kebab shop (colloquially known as an “elephant leg). 

Slices of doner kebab are served in a pitta bread with salad and sauce (or with chips if you’re really being naughty).

Shish Kebab 

A shish kebab (also known as a Turkish Sis Kebab) comprises chunks of meat on a skewer, which are then cooked over a grill and served in a pitta bread with salad and sauce. If you walk into most kebab shops, you’ll usually see these skewer prepared in trays, normally covered in middle eastern spices, or sometimes glazed in a marinade. 

So, now you understand the difference, you’re probably wondering, which is healthier, doner kebab or shish kebab? 

Before we compare them it’s worth noting that one of the biggest impacts on your calorie count will probably be the chips you choose have with your kebab. If you’re looking to reduce your waistline, start by cutting the carbs and not going for the “with chips” option. 

Also, kebabs are a well-known food to get when you’re drunk or hungover. So, it’s worth mentioning that cutting out large amounts of alcohol from your diet will almost certainly have more impact than which type of kebab you choose, and let’s face it, we rarely want a kebab when we’re sober anyway! With those caveats in place, let’s compare the two most popular kebab options. 

Quality of Meat 

The traditional Turkish recipe for a doner kebab was to use thin slices of lamb shoulder marinated with garlic, onion, and spices. However, the majority of the kebab houses you’ll visit today will use the less expensive minced lamb variety, which frequently contains reconstituted meat, fatty off-cuts, salt, a lot of oil, and fillers like rusk. Shockingly, this can also include meat other than the variety advertised. Some “lamb” kebabs have even found to contain pork! 

However, when you order a shish kebab, you can see the cubes of unadulterated meat on the skewer. Because the meat is not minced, you can see that it hasn’t been bulked out with other less appealing elements. This isn’t to say that every doner kebab has poor quality meat, or that the Shish kebab is going to be the best quality meat in the world, but it is at least all meat. 

If you go to a nice Turkish restaurant for dinner, you might well get thinly sliced lamb shoulder in your doner kebab, but that’s less likely if you’re getting a doner from a takeaway at 2am. 

Calories & Fat Content 

A large doner kebab and pitta bread with salad (550g) can easily top 1300-1500 calories (kcal). Add a portion of chips, garlic mayonnaise and a can of coke, and you’re probably going north of 2000 calories. This is almost your entire daily calorie intake, which isn’t great considering that they are often eaten as a “fourth meal” after a night of drinking. Most shockingly, that same large doner could have as much as 88 grams of fat, more than 125% of your daily recommended intake. 

By comparison, a Shish kebab of the same size (550g) contains only 820 kcal. Now we say “only” but 820 calories is still a huge amount by the standards of any other meal. It’s nearly half your calories for the day. But most importantly, the fat content will be 22g, a quarter of the fat content for a doner kebab! 

So, Which Should You Choose – Doner or Shish? 

We’re not here to tell you what to eat. If you’re really craving a doner kebab, then get one. However, if kebabs are a regular part of your diet, it might be time to switch from doner to shish. 

As with all dietary choices, it’s not about what you eat for one individual meal. What matters is the cumulative effect of your diet. 

Consider that if end you end up getting a large doner kebab with chips and a can of coke every weekend, by the end of the year you would have consumed over 100,000 calories, or the equivalent of over a month and a half of recommended caloric intake – just from having kebabs. The equivalent for shish kebabs would be almost half of that.  

Most importantly, once you get past your body’s drunken craving for the doner’s high fat content, most people would agree that shish kebabs actually taste much nicer! 

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