Levantine Beef Shawarma (with Tahini Sauce and Pickles)
Paper-thin flank steak marinated in onion juice, yogurt, vinegar, lime, garlic and a toasted shawarma spice blend, seared hard in lamb fat with tomato, onion and parsley, and wrapped in warm bread with tahini sauce and pickles.
Shawarma is the Arabic name for the same turning spit. Wikipedia says the word renders the Turkish çevirme, "turning," that the vertical-spit technique first appeared in the Ottoman Empire in the 19th century as döner, and that an Egyptian Arabic-English dictionary of 1895 already listed šāwirma. Lebanese immigrants carried it abroad: Wikipedia says they brought it to Mexico, where it became tacos al pastor, and are thought to have popularized it in Nigeria. In the Middle East, chicken shawarma usually comes with garlic sauce, fries and pickles; beef is often paired with tarator, a sauce of tahini, garlic and lemon.
This recipe is from Nermine Mansour for Serious Eats. She grew up in Egypt in the 1980s and 1990s, when shawarma shops spread with migrants and refugees from Lebanon, Syria and Palestine, and her model is Abu Al Sham, a hole-in-the-wall on the Alexandria corniche run by a Syrian man. At home she slices the beef thin, toasts and grinds her own spice blend and sears the meat in liyeh, rendered lamb fat, the fat that bastes a real spit.
Why it works the kitchen science
Onion juice, not onion
Strained onion juice carries all the flavor into the meat with none of the pulp, which would scorch in the hot pan.
Lamb fat in a hot pan
Liyeh is the fat that bastes a shawarma spit, so searing in it gives skillet beef the flavor of the street version; small batches keep the pan hot enough to brown instead of steam.
Step by step
- Step 1
Crush the cardamom pods and take out the seeds. Toast the cardamom seeds, peppercorns, allspice, cumin and coriander in a dry skillet over medium heat, tossing, 30 seconds to 1 minute, until fragrant. Cool 5 minutes, then grind to a fine powder with the remaining blend spices.
- Step 2
Purée the onion in a food processor and press it through a fine strainer into a large bowl; discard the pulp. Whisk in the yogurt, vinegar, lime juice, olive oil, garlic, 2 tbsp spice blend and salt. Add the beef, massage to coat, cover and refrigerate 3 to 8 hours.
- Step 3
Whisk the tahini, yogurt, lime juice, salt and pepper into a smooth sauce, adding warm water a tablespoon at a time if it is too thick to spread. Refrigerate.
- Step 4
Lift the beef out of the marinade, letting the excess drip back into the bowl (discard the rest), and let it sit 20 minutes to take the chill off.
- Step 5
Melt the lamb fat in a large cast-iron or carbon-steel skillet over medium-high heat until shimmering. Sear the beef in a single layer, in batches, stirring now and then, 5 to 7 minutes per batch, until browned and 145°F in the thickest strip. Keep the pan hot between batches.
- Step 6
Return all the beef to the pan, add the tomato and red onion and cook 2 minutes, until they just soften. Take the pan off the heat, stir in the parsley and rest 3 minutes.
- Step 7
Spread each bread with tahini sauce (and harissa, if you like), add pickles and about 1/2 cup shawarma, roll up and serve with more sauce and pickles, and fries if you want them.
Levantine Beef Shawarma (with Tahini Sauce and Pickles)
Serves 8 · about 8 wraps · 1 hr total
Shawarma spice blend
- 5 green cardamom pods
- 1 tbsp black peppercorns
- 1 3/4 tbsp allspice berries
- 1 tsp cumin seeds
- 1 tsp coriander seeds
- 1 tsp each sweet paprika, garlic powder, onion powder, dried oregano, ground sumac and ground turmeric
- 1 tsp red pepper flakes or Aleppo pepper
- 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
Marinade and beef
- 1 medium yellow onion (8 oz), quartered
- 1 cup plain whole-milk yogurt
- 2 tbsp red wine vinegar or distilled white vinegar
- 2 tbsp lime juice
- 1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
- 4 garlic cloves, minced
- 2 tbsp shawarma spice blend
- 2 tsp Diamond Crystal kosher salt
- 2 1/4 lb flank steak or top round, cut into 1/4-inch strips
Tahini sauce
- 1 cup tahini
- 1/2 cup plain whole-milk yogurt
- 2 tbsp lime juice, plus more to taste
- Salt, pepper and warm water as needed
To cook and serve
- 1 1/4 oz (35 g) liyeh (rendered lamb fat), or neutral oil
- 1 Roma tomato, seeded and diced
- 1 medium red onion, diced
- 1/4 cup finely chopped parsley
- 8 pitas or other flatbreads
- Pickled cucumbers and pickled turnips
- Harissa and french fries (optional)
Method
- Crush the cardamom pods and take out the seeds. Toast the cardamom seeds, peppercorns, allspice, cumin and coriander in a dry skillet over medium heat, tossing, 30 seconds to 1 minute, until fragrant. Cool 5 minutes, then grind to a fine powder with the remaining blend spices.
- Purée the onion in a food processor and press it through a fine strainer into a large bowl; discard the pulp. Whisk in the yogurt, vinegar, lime juice, olive oil, garlic, 2 tbsp spice blend and salt. Add the beef, massage to coat, cover and refrigerate 3 to 8 hours.
- Whisk the tahini, yogurt, lime juice, salt and pepper into a smooth sauce, adding warm water a tablespoon at a time if it is too thick to spread. Refrigerate.
- Lift the beef out of the marinade, letting the excess drip back into the bowl (discard the rest), and let it sit 20 minutes to take the chill off.
- Melt the lamb fat in a large cast-iron or carbon-steel skillet over medium-high heat until shimmering. Sear the beef in a single layer, in batches, stirring now and then, 5 to 7 minutes per batch, until browned and 145°F in the thickest strip. Keep the pan hot between batches.
- Return all the beef to the pan, add the tomato and red onion and cook 2 minutes, until they just soften. Take the pan off the heat, stir in the parsley and rest 3 minutes.
- Spread each bread with tahini sauce (and harissa, if you like), add pickles and about 1/2 cup shawarma, roll up and serve with more sauce and pickles, and fries if you want them.
Adapted from Nermine Mansour, "Beef Shawarma", Serious Eats (October 6, 2025), serves 8. We follow it as written: a spice blend of toasted cardamom, black pepper, allspice, cumin and coriander ground with paprika, garlic and onion powder, oregano, sumac, turmeric, red pepper and cinnamon; 2 1/4 lb flank steak or top round in 1/4-inch strips marinated 3 to 8 hours in strained onion juice, yogurt, vinegar, lime, olive oil, garlic, 2 tablespoons of the blend and salt; a tahini, yogurt and lime sauce; and the meat seared in batches in 35 g lamb fat over medium-high heat, 5 to 7 minutes per batch, then tossed with tomato, red onion and parsley. We leave out Serious Eats' final step, which smokes the meat with a lit charcoal briquette inside a covered skillet in the kitchen (see Food safety baseline). The 145°F check, the 3-minute rest and the pickle amount are ours. Serious Eats. Ingredient list follows the source; the method is in our own words.
All sources (2)
Tips
- Freeze top round about 2 hours before slicing to cut it thin and even, as Mansour suggests; slice against the grain into strips no wider than 1/2 inch.
- Liyeh is sold at many halal butchers; neutral oil works, with less flavor.
- Toasted, freshly ground spices make the blend; keep the extra in a jar for chicken.
- Mansour also suggests New York strip; flank and top round are the budget cuts.
The rules people argue about
What the sources agree on, what they don't, and what is just a good story.
- Shawarma comes from the Turkish döner. Documented (Wikipedia): the name renders çevirme, "turning," and the vertical spit is Ottoman.
- Chicken gets garlic sauce, beef gets tahini. Folklore as a rule: Wikipedia gives garlic sauce with chicken, but marks tarator with beef "citation needed"; Egyptian and Palestinian shawarma use tahini widely.
- Lebanese immigrants turned shawarma into tacos al pastor. Documented as Wikipedia's account (see the tacos hub's Tacos al Pastor).
- Real shawarma must be smoked over charcoal. Folklore: Serious Eats adds a charcoal-smoke step for flavor; the spit itself is roasted in front of a fire, not smoked.
- Fries belong inside. Disputed by place: Wikipedia lists fries with chicken shawarma in the Middle East; Mansour calls them optional, on the side.
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