Grilled Chicken Kebabs with Fresh Herb Salad

Get the full recipe at https://www.daphneoz.com/grilled-chicken-kebabs-with-fresh-herb-salad/

Try these ultra juicy, grilled chicken kebabs – the perfect smoky, richly flavorful meat-on-a-stick to pack for quick picnic lunches or pair with a crisp and hydrating romaine salad for a sumptuously filling lunch or dinner spread.

I use a combination of spices inspired by traditional Shawarma – cumin, coriander, cinnamon, garlic — plus lemon, paprika, and a handful of fresh herbs to make sure every bite is beyond. I could happily eat this combo every day, it’s that good!

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Today we’re going to make grilled chicken schwarma kebabs with a crisp Roma and Herb salad in case you’re not familiar with schwarma it is traditionally speaking lamb very thinly sliced pushed together onto a stick in sort of a cone shape and then rotated on that spit in front of a heat Source

Until the edges are golden brown and crisp the fat kind of dribbl down and drips down as it’s roasting and cooking and basting and it and it just is so rich and delicious and then they shave that golden brown um exterior down and revealing new meat that then gets golden

Brown again so it’s just like NeverEnding delicious really rich and wonderful meat uh that can be served with rice or in a wrap um with salad like we’re going to do today and even though it is often times done with lamb it can really feature pretty much any

Meat that you like we’re going to do chicken breast today which obviously loves to be bathed in wonderful spices a little olive oil a little lemon garlic it’s really fragrant and wonderful and flavorful um which is which is something we’re always aspiring to with chicken breast a great lean protein of course

It’s a lighter meal but you’re never going to be thinking about that you’re going to be thinking about how jubilent and colorful and exciting and perfect for summer when you want to crank up that Grill and get something refreshing but filling on the table that everyone

Can enjoy and I think that is going to be just what we’re doing here today so the first thing I’m going to do is start with my dry spice blend I have some cumin some coriander and lots of sweet paprika I have to say paprika and chicken to

Me one of the truly great combos I am going to add a little bit of cinnamon which I have to say I think is something that adds to the sort of intoxicating nature and smell of uh this schwarma preparation is that you frequently will find some kind of like sweeter spice

Included a nutmeg an all spice cinnamon something just it just Peaks a little something different and I like it spicy you guys know that so I’m going to add a few dashes of red chili flake nothing crazy just a little something I do want some salt of course plenty of kosher

Salt to make sure this grills up really nice and flavorful I would like to have some Cracked Pepper and I want a bit of olive oil and a squeeze of fresh lemon juice and the lemon juice is really great for tenderizing the meat helping to bring

Some flavor of course too um but really keeping it nice and juicy along with that olive oil those are the spices that I love to have here if you wanted to add oregano you definitely could if you wanted to add more chili in here you could I really think the paprika and

Coriander Trio is what’s most essential here with salt and pepper so you definitely should feel free to customize I also want to add a couple tablespoons of freshly chopped parsley um and there is something about the way that fresh herb Cooks on the grill and flavors the meat and the veg

That is really lovely so I just pulled off some fresh Le leaves and the tender stems and I am going to after I finish this first chop just give them another rough chop so that we’re not having big leaves but more even distribution in the marinade into our

Spice mix the one thing I’m missing here today because I don’t have it is onion powder love some onion powder on here but we are going to stack some red onion onto the skewers so we will still get that let’s add a few garlic cloves just

Crushed into the mix here let’s do do three call it since mine are kind of small if you have bigger ones you could do just two and just pop them from their skins I do like to press or grate these garlic cloves into the marinade we want this to be totally infused throughout

Some fresh ginger going into our marinade I took like a you know 1 and 1/2 inch little guy little knob of Ginger here and I’m just using a spoon to scrape off this soft outer skin then grab a micro plan and just give it a quick grate to release all that

Wonderful warming Ginger Essence now we are in business okay ah lovely so depending on how thick your chicken is you’ll want to slice it in half a few times um we’re basically butterflying this chicken these happen to be quite thick so I might actually butterfly it a few times over um but

Really we’re just trying to get it to a nice you know half qu an inch to half an inch thickness and small bite-sized pieces so start by taking your breast and just cutting it in half widthwise and we can see that it’s still a little

Bit thick in places so I might go again and really just get us that lovely even thickness here and then slicing it just into bite-sized pieces nothing too fancy or precise here and I am going to trim out any gristly pieces like so because these want to cook up nice and even ly

We don’t want to be wrestling with tough pieces and that’s pretty much it it’s not that fun to watch raw chicken so I’m going to speed through this part but just remember you want to get even thickness throughout in your vegetables and in your protein so it Cooks evenly

And especially chicken breast it can dry out really fast so I’m going to make these pieces thin and small so that they’ll cook fast and stay nice and juicy so I’m going to add the chicken pieces to a plastic bag and that just helps to contain them and make them

Marinade process very simple to execute all you’re going to do is then pour maybe 3/4 of this mix over top reserving just a little bit for our vegetable friends let me wash my hands quickly seal that bag and give it a lovely toss to evenly coat all your chicken

Pieces and then this is going to go in the fridge at least half an hour do three four 5 hours if you have the time up to 8 hours or overnight because um the lemon juice in here I wouldn’t want more than that but just give that delicious flavoring time to soak into

Your chicken the reality is it is so pungent and flavorful already that if you only had the half an hour or you had no time at all it would still be delicious okay to the fridge while we get our vegetables prepared all right new board a knife or

If you were strategic you would have chopped your vegetables first which is what meant to do then got distracted um and all we want to do now is whatever vegetables you’re using you could use zucchini here I love the bread bell pepper because I think it adds a little

Bit of sweetness here that I like and a red onion also for a little bit of sweetness and like we talked about before with the chicken you just want to make sure that whatever we’re skewering onto our stick is going to cook at roughly the same time as each other so

Everything stays lovely and juicy um and to that end I will be cutting our pepper pepper into roughly the same shape and size as our chicken pieces and adding it to the bowl with our delicious spice and herb and lemon and garlic blend and I’m going to go yeah two bell peppers I

Think should be plenty for in here just sort of skimming that inner rib out and then for the onion all you want to do is slice it in half down the center and remove the two ends and the skin of course trim away any less than perfect piece P we’ll give ourselves

Some beautiful sheets of onion to play with just by doing two horizontal cuts and then one vertical cut and what you’re left with are these great pieces that are easy to skewer on and should cook it roughly the same time as the chicken toss those to the bowl with our

Other pieces of vegetable make sure they’re nice and coated just go ahead and break your little onion wedges up we don’t need them sticking together and these can hang out until the chicken’s ready so while the chicken and veg are marinating let’s make our quick little

Yogurt sauce so it has time for all the flavors to blend and melt together I’ve got a cup of non-fat Greek yogurt here you can use lowfat for sure you can use regular fat for sure to this I’m going to add a bunch of fresh herbs herbs are

A great way to add tons of flavor they have detoxifying properties they’re obviously vibrant and green they’re usually plentifully available if you bothered to plant some earlier in the spring or have Potters out in your yard um and they’re one of my favorite ways to J up otherwise very simple

Preparations which this definitely is I am going to pull some fresh mint leaves which is something I always have growing like wild um at my house because it does grow like a weed um so fresh and vibrant feeling so you know two stems worth of leaves here and

Just give that a little chiod a little ribbon cut and I do find that with like really creamy sauces like this this is a very particular this is a d ISM that we might not have talked about yet I need the herbs to be big enough that I can tell they are fresh

And present but small enough that I’m not getting any big bites of like just a random Leaf I really this is a yogurt sauce it is meant to be creamy first and foremost with flavoring elements scattered throughout but if those flavorings get too crazy then suddenly

It’s an herb sauce with yogurt mixed in so our beautiful mint leaves going in here and then because I love Dill I absolutely need to have some dill here as well um Dill’s optional if you don’t love Dill you can leave it off but I

Just you got to have it it’s so vibrant and it’s got such a unique flavor that I find really you’ll crave you’ll want it here and I’ll leave those to the side for some garnish why not and then I don’t want to overwhelm this too much

More but maybe just a little parsley to Echo what we have going on in our um marinade so just a few pulls of those leaves and mince away if you have some tender stems you can go ahead and keep those in but thicker Woody ones would not include

Those and this is really a place where it is much more about the soft and Tender Leaf than it is about any texture from the stems ideally let’s also add some garlic to this mix parsley in this is a sauce that’s obviously served raw so you don’t want to overwhelm it with

Too much garlic maybe a clove maybe two and I already have my press dirty I also have my pick of the litter I have my press and my greater dirty so I can use whatever I want but I will use my press cuz it’s just simple and then let’s grate in some

Lemon zest and I’ll also add the juice of half a lemon just to keep it really nice and bright and zingy not too much zest I don’t I don’t want it bitter or anything I just want a little hint of that lemon essential oil in addition to that delicious

Juiciness which brings such a nice tartness to this sauce really helps to balance the richness of those beautiful spice flavors on the chicken Salt we need some salt I actually don’t mind a few crunches of salt here but any salt is fine little crunchy salt situation mix that

Up oh my gosh the lemon just hit wow wow wow wow M oh yeah oh that’s delightful while we have this board all dirty anyway let’s go ahead and assemble the rest of the herbs and scallions for our salad guys it’s a salad should we have

Like I don’t know a salad bowl I think we should here she is um this is the slightly smaller Bowl as you can see I didn’t go crazy and insane on you today I have some beautiful romae lettuce that I washed and dried here as the base very

Crisp and crunchy plentiful looking love how fluffy these leaves are and to that I mean I’m really focusing on having this be a fresh from the garden collection of greenness so more of the same herbs again more Dill more parsley more mint and then I’ll also add in a

Few scallions which I think are such a great um way to keep this very green and fresh and simple but really just punch up the flavor quite a lot so just skim off that outer sort of slippery skin I think I think three Scout will be good

Here trim Off The Roots and then I find just sort of Staggering the um scallions like so lets me do a lovely little cut on the bias that looks so pretty this is a great way to get scallions for garnish and obviously will look great in

Our salad and I kind of stop for usages like this I’m going to stop right when the leaves start to get get a little bit darker green and just more flimsy I want just like those crisp beautiful elements of scallion going into our greens and then let’s get our herbs

Going for the parsley I’m going to treat it sort of like more lettuce I’m going to leave the leaves very much intact I’m kind of just going to pinch them to release some of those essential oils get as much flavor as possible but really let them build this salad um as a leaf

More than just as a garnish and then a little bit of mint I will throw on here as well oh good I’ll use my little my little Dill situation few more few more little pieces of Dill we don’t need to overwhelm the deal I know it is a highly

Polarizing situation then let’s get our mint cut up again and we’ll make a quick vinegret that will let sit anytime you can let a little sauce like a vinegret or our yogurt sauce have a few minutes to sit before you plan to serve it you just give give the garlic and the onion

And the herbs a chance to really Infuse their flavor even more so patience of virtue only a few mint leaves here mint can be a little overpowering in a salad so I just want the taste of it nothing too crazy and that’s it okay so we have our

Base of the salad nice and prepped let’s just make a quick vinegret I’m going to keep it really simple honestly you could just do olive oil and lemon juice here it would be great um I’m going to do just some olive oil lemon juice garlic again dried

Oregano a teaspoon of honey just to give it a little bit of sweetness to pair with all this wonderful heady spice that we have going on with the chicken and the yogurt and everything else so a whole lemon cuz we’re just going to use the bare minimum of olive oil needed here

Really keeping it nice and tangy and bright the honey will help emulsify so we’ll still get that great viscosity couple tablespoons of olive olive oil just to give us some body here let’s get another garlic glove this is a nice big one so I don’t think we’ll need more

Than one but we’ll taste it and adjust as needed garlic in salt pepper beautiful how about some dried oregano wow somebody likes her dried oregano it’s probably my this or cumin my most utilized spices just a little squeeze of Honey date syrup obviously works great too teaspoon of honey whiskin

Taste oh so good guys so bright and vibrant with that lemon juice a tiny bit of Honey muting it out so it’s really balanced oregano popping the right amount of garlic save you for later let’s skewer some chicken let’s Grill it up let’s have some lunch so our chicken

Has marinated I gave it about 2 hours here our veg are ready to go I soaked my wooden skewers in just a little salted water for the last half hour just so that they have less of a chance of burning and actually help to infuse moisture and flavor into the meat as it

Cooks think about putting a veggie on first as sort of like a stop at the base of your skewer which just catches all the delicious juiciness coming off your chicken but there’s no wrong way to do it and I’ll do a couple pieces of chicken and then add an onion couple

Pieces of chicken add a pepper and actually if they’re folding over if they’re larger pieces you can sort of I just fold it in half and just thread that ribbon on you can also if there’s like a larger slice like this that you’re worried if you fold over it might

Not work as well you can kind of double thread it o the double thread um onion and schwarma they’ll typically pack the meat together which I do like it keeps it really juicy but I find if I leave a little space I get even more Char and smoke and uh and just

Crispy areas which I like let me tell you something else while you are making these you might as well make a bunch because The Leftovers on these are truly phenomenal so good over salad so good in sandwiches just chopped up and added as like a little stir fry to the side of

Your main meal delightful okay chicken is done just a few veg left which you can put on a skewer and have as a veggie skewer let’s get grilling washing you can actually do up to this step in the process in advance one thing to remember though is before you get to

The grill you want to take it out of the fridge at least 20 minutes to half an hour in advance so it has time to let some of that chill come off which will make sure it Cooks as evenly as possible get those gorgeous charm marks all the

Rest I have my grill plate getting piping hot um over a high flame right now I greased it with just a little avocado oil you could use olive oil now I hear it sizzling and cracking at me so here we go I’m going to go four a time I don’t

Want to overcrowd the pan I want to leave plenty of space for the chicken to sear and not steam plus I want full contact on the the grill paint which is another thing if you want to get a um real sear you can get a weighted either

Like a grilled press or a weighted pan and press it down if you find that your chicken’s not getting that dark really like beautiful Char that you’re craving let’s see how it goes if I need it I’ll get it if I don’t I won’t make more of a

Mess I’m going to let these go about 4 minutes per side just to make sure that the chicken is cooked through perfectly let’s see how we’re looking here oh oh my gosh do you see this that’s so we like then we let it go a little bit longer and you guys know we

Don’t wrestle with our meat here if it’s sticking to the grill let it continue to go when it gets those Char marks it will actually form almost a crust that pulls away from the grill really easily it’ll be time to flip no stress rotate these guys oh

Yeah okay so that guy’s stuck a little bit I’m not going to mess around with him how about you are you ready yeah you’re ready get your tools ready because these look phenomenal they’re ready to come off the grill gorgeous golden brown charred in places chicken cooked through veggies softened onions

Sweetened wow summer meal Perfection look at that yum okay um I’m going to let those rest a few minutes skewers are ready they are so gorgeous just going to say you’re going to look like a star when you make this recipe I’m going to go ahead and dress

The salad now um and I always like to just give it a quick whisk and then kind of drizzle around the edge of the bowl and that ensures that every leaf gets covered and you don’t get soggy spots oh yum delicious and this is just a light

Little coating here to make sure every leaf is glossy cuz remember we have in in addition to the skewers being so flavorful on their own with all those great schwarma spices we also have our yummy yogurt dipping sauce that I stuck in the fridge to keep nice and cold

Because I find tastes best that way you could also add grated cucumber to that yogurt dip if you want it more like a siki flare but again this was sort of a simple extravagance day lovely things to make you feel good and taste delicious I am also a big fan

Of feeling full after I eat so I like a big m of salad underneath my skewers just makes it feel very robust and plentiful beautiful salad with all those fresh herbs so crunchy so green so vibrant ooh ooh guys wow let me tell you something really special is that the herbs here

Kind of do all the work for you like even if our dressing wasn’t delicious which it is you would still have a truly spectacular move just a little dollop why not then get a skewer that has 10 minutes of rest so that it really has a

Chance to soak up all those yummy juices and that gorgeous Char and oh my gosh ladies and gentlemen summertime Splendor is served check her out delightful all right let’s taste this dang skewer all right the pepper part first M so sweet and caramelized wow just wow first of all I’m sorry chicken

Breast never before never before so juicy never before so flavorful love the little charred bits on top okay if you were going to eat this normally you would just easily slide it right off off of the stick and you can see how perfectly cooked every piece of

Chicken is lovely and opaque all the way through super juicy I mean look at this are you kidding me with all that great Char on top just delicious wow and let me tell you something even better because you let it hang out on the grill for a hot minute

The smokiness really infused into that meat as well wow all right put it all together with your crisp super flavorful nice and tangy salad a little dipping sauce right on top we’re going big bites club today people I could literally eat this every single day all summer long no issues

Whatsoever have it be ridiculously delicious protein packed veggie resplendant grilled to Perfection although I will also give you a technique to make it in the oven if you don’t feel like turning on your grill if you do not make this immediately you are in big trouble mainly with yourself for not treating

Yourself to such a truly delicious bite