Greek Chicken Souvlaki

The quintessential Greek dish, this recipe for greek chicken souvlaki is made with simple ingredients for the solid authentic summer meal.

This is a guest post from Livinglou.com.

Our family lives in Greece, so we grew up spending our summers on the beautiful island of Kephalonia which is in the Ionian sea.

This island is beautiful, and while it doesn't have the white and blue houses like Santorini, it is filled with pastel coloured houses with terracotta roofs. There are white and yellow sandy beaches, perfectly turquoise water, olive groves and wineries.

Today we're sharing what we think is probably the most quintessential Greek dish: chicken souvlaki. In Kephalonia, souvlaki is traditionally made with pork, but for as long as we can remember, we have always preferred chicken.

The island lifestyle is completely different from the go-go-go, frantic pace of our life in Toronto. We're sad that we won't be heading back this summer, but we try to bring a little bit of Greece into our daily life through food. There are a few things that are important when cooking Greek or Mediterranean-style dishes, but we believe that the most important is to start with a high-quality olive oil – this is the base of so many dishes.

Our grandfather actually makes his own olive oil which is incredibly good. It's so smooth and fruity, unlike any olive oil you can buy here. We know that having your own olive trees and making your own olive oil sounds insane to us, but it's actually pretty common over there – we wish we had the same thing here!

What we love about Greek cuisine is that for the most part, it's incredibly simple, but oh so flavourful. It basically encompasses our entire philosophy around food; simple, fresh and flavourful. Over there, local produce is plentiful and everything is bursting with flavour.

There's nothing we love more than heading to the local farm and picking up whatever produce they have picked from the field and letting myself be inspired. That experience is completely different from going to the grocery store and even better than going to a farmer's market.

When we're not cooking, we're ordering in from a local, family-run takeout restaurant in our village. They make the best souvlaki and gyros and deliver it right to your door via motorbike. This Greek chicken souvlaki is inspired by this tiny, hole-in-the-wall restaurant and we think we figured out the flavours perfectly.

This recipe starts with a simple marinade for the chicken, a combination of olive oil, lemon juice, salt, oregano and garlic powder. We opt to use garlic powder instead of fresh garlic here because when grilling, garlic tends to burn which would give this dish a bitter taste. You could also switch out the dried oregano for dried thyme here, as those herbs are pretty interchangeable in recipes.

What to enjoy with your Greek Chicken Souvlaki

We love to serve this with traditional tzatziki sauce and Greek salad. Or try these other Greek favorites:

Greek Chicken Souvlaki Recipe

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Ingredients

• 2 lb chicken, cut into 1-1/2″ pieces
• ¼ cup olive oil
• ¼ cup lemon juice
• 1 tsp dried oregano
• 1 tsp salt
• ½ tsp garlic powder
• ½ tsp black pepper

Method

1. In a glass bowl, whisk olive oil with lemon juice, oregano, salt, pepper, and garlic powder until combined. Add chicken, cover, and refrigerate at least 30 minutes and up to 4 hours.
2. Preheat grill to medium-high heat and soak wooden skewers for 20 minutes to prevent burning. Thread chicken onto skewers.
3. Grill, covered, for 4-5 minutes per side. Serve with lemon wedges and tzatziki sauce if you prefer.