How to Make your Own Chicken Gyros

Lettuce, tomato, onion—staples of any fridge—can entertain you far beyond a sandwich, my friend.

With so many vegetables and so little time before they all went bad, I wanted to create something delicious enough to trump the sandwich, impressive enough to earn some street cred, and simple enough so that I could eat rather soon as I was starving. I decided to construct my own gyros, which would require nothing more than whipping up a quick tzatziki dressing before essentially throwing all the contents of my fridge into a pita.

The Tzatziki:

First, pour 1 cup of your favorite plain Greek yogurt into a mixing bowl.

Then, cut a large cucumber into two halves. You can wrap up one of the halves and put it back in your fridge. Take the second half and cut it in half length-wise, exposing all the seeds.

If you are crafty with a knife, carefully carve out the seeds. If not, you can use a spoon to hollow out the cucumber.

Next, dice the cucumber. You can do this by turning the cucumber so that the hollowed-out side is facing down. Cut thin strips length-wise, and then take your knife and cut perpendicular across the strips.

Toss the cucumber into the yogurt along with about 1 teaspoon of finely chopped dill, 1 teaspoon garlic powder, ¼ cup feta cheese, and mix.

Voila. Tzatziki without a blender.

The Chicken:

Slice a chicken breast into thin strips. If you are using frozen chicken, it may be easier to slice the meat while it is still a little frozen.

Once the chicken has been defrosted and sliced, season the strips with salt, pepper, and a little bit of tarragon (just enough to give the chicken a light yellow color).

Sautee the strips on a medium heat setting, making sure that every strip has access to the bottom of the pan without being overcrowded, or else you will not get nice browned edges.

The Gyro:

Before plating, I placed my whole wheat pita on the same pan that I used for the chicken just long enough to get a nice browning.

Sliding the pita right from pan to plate, I spread a layer of hummus onto the pita before laying down a bed of lettuce, diced onion, tomato, chicken, tzatziki, and more feta cheese.

You can fork-and-knife this bad boy, but I’ve found it most efficient to fold up the edges and just dive in mouth first.

Easy-to-make Valentine's Day treats

Sometimes, it can be mutually beneficial to take advantage of friends who are easily impressed. My easy-to-make white chocolate covered pretzels are a snack that continually manage to astound people. I get to enjoy my new position as queen of creativity and craft while my friends get to enjoy free candy.

However, I may have allowed my ego to get the better of me. Although I usually resort to just using a microwave to melt the white chocolate (hence the easy factor), I decided to upgrade my white chocolate to double-boiler status. If you've never used a double-boiler before, then this will be as much of an adventure for you as it will be for me.

Ingredients:

• one bag of white chocolate morsels
• one bag classic-style pretzel rods
• one pot
• one mixing bowl that, when placed on top of pot, is large enough to create a seal with the rim of the pot, preferably glass or metal
• spatula
• wax paper
• one sheet pan
• sprinkles
• paper plate

Procedure:

Essentially, a double boiler is like a makeshift fondue pot. Heat water in the pot, but do not bring it to a boil. The goal of this double-boiler process is to have the steam of the water heat the bottom of your mixing bowl, which is why you want to choose a bowl that seals the steam in from the top. So, clearly, I missed the boat with this Pyrex idea.

After a few more failed attempts using a skillet, a sauce pan, and a plate (don't question my motives), I finally landed on this bright blue mixing bowl, which I hoped was microwave-safe. It perfectly sealed in the steam and was deep enough for dipping my pretzel sticks.

Sure enough, after only a few minutes, the morsels were melted into a thick cream. I tried to better distribute the heat by mixing the chocolate with the spatula before going in for the kill.

The bowl wasn't deep enough to accomplish my preferred coverage, so I used the spatula to smooth the chocolate down the pretzel.

After letting the excess drip back into the bowl, I embellished the sticks with some sprinkles, with a plate underneath me, before placing the final pretzel sticks on a sheet pan lined with wax paper.

And, the classy line:

Happy Valentine's Day! 

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