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A tribute to the inventor of the Doner Kebab
(May 9 2009)

Like Chicken Tikka Korma, the Doner Kebab has become a favourite food for the post-pub Brit, often at the expense of Fish and Chip shops. I always assumed that this food hailed from some exotic part of Greece or Turkey, so was surprised to find it had been invented in Germany in 1971 by Mahmut Aygun, who recently died in Berlin at the age of 87.

Aygun, a Turkish immigrant, had the idea of putting traditional Turkish Kebab meat, consisting of roast lamb and spices, inside a pitta bread. This made it easier as a take-away dish and allowed customers who had been drinking to wander off into the night with their food and eat it on the way, often covered in the yogurt sauce he also invented.

Doner Kebabs can consist of up to 50% of a person's daily calorific need, although to be fair to Mr Aygun, he would not have used the rotating 'elephant leg' of uncertain origin so familiar to Brits. It is named after the Turkish word 'dondurmek', which means a rotating roast.

Link1: how unhealthy is a doner kebab?

Random fun fact: Research by the UK's Food Standards Agency in 2006 found that 18.5% of doner takeaways posed a significant threat to public health, and 0.8% posed an imminent threat.

Related links:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/7841890.stm