We here at Marthafied love food. So when we were approached by Westfield London to take part in their Beat the Head Chef Westfield Recipe Challenge, we were more than happy to oblige. And bit scared, I must admit. The Beat the Head Chef Westfield Recipe Challenge promotes Westfield London’s We Are Dining Offers (find the offers here until February 28th) and how it works is that first you visit a restaurant at Westfield London and then try to recreated the exact dish. I for one am very, very familiar with Westfield London (White City) fabulous dining choices and will definitely take advantage of the fabulous offers. There’s so much choice – there’s Carluccio’s for Italian, Jamie’s Italian is a must if you looove Jamie Oliver (like I do), the always fabulous Mexican Street Food joint Wahaca, Bill’s (well, I just love Bill’s atmo), Fire & Stone for pizzas around the world and so many, many more.
We chose to visit The Real Greek for our recipe challenge. Well, because I have never cooked any Greek food and it’s called a challenge. So yes, I thought to challenge myself the ‘Australian MasterChef’ style. Just to make sure that I got all the details right I dragged Kris (literally no actual dragging required) with me to The Real Greek in Westfield London.
The challenge dish was the signature dish of the particular restaurant, which in The Real Greek’s case was Souvlaki. We chose the Halloumi and the Lamb Gyro Souvlaki. I am not going to lie – I had never eaten Souvlaki before, but I will definitely eat it again. Souvlaki is Greek street food (‘street food’ used liberally). It’s like a wrap. Souvlaki is a flatbread filled with Halloumi, Lamb Gyro, Chicken or Falafel plus tomatoes and red onion. Then topped with tzatziki.
The Real Greek Souvlaki was as delicious as it looks. Everything tasted so fresh and the Souvlaki was bursting of flavor. We also had some fries with some extra delish mayo. And of course Greek Salad. That’s just the way we roll…
Hungry yet? If you are in London-town be sure to visit Westfield London and try the Souvlaki at The Real Greek. Westfield London’s We Are Dining Campaign has a coupon for 25% of at The Real Greek (valid until February 28th). Download the We Are Dining offers here.
The Lamb Gyro Souvlaki was my absolute favorite. Kris liked more the Halloumi Souvlaki. The Lamb is spiced and cooked in such way that I realised I would never be able to recreate that. Even the Halloumi tasted like it had a secret ingredient. I was confident that otherwise I could create something that would look about the same, but the biggest hurdle would be the taste.
Gone in less than … hhmmm… I want to say 60 seconds, but that would just be crazy. All gone and not even a crumb left. It was so good.
And the Greek rosé wine was not bad either. The Saturday lunch experience at The Real Greek Westfield, which is part of the Westfield London’s We Are Dining Offer Campaign, was extremely pleasurable. The staff was super nice and helpful. The restaurant was clean and quite spacey. Even though the restaurant was busy the service was fast and the overall atmosphere was relaxed and just so very ‘Greek’. The food was to die-for and there certainly was more than enough of it. The sad part was that neither I or Kris had any room left for a coffee or a dessert. Well, there’s always next time… A shout-out to the fab service and food at The Real Greek Westfield London!!!
Next day after the pleasurable visit to The Real Greek in Westfield London it was time for the scary and hard part of the Beat the Head Chef Westfield Recipe Challenge – to recreated the Halloumi and Lamb Souvlaki. I suppose I could have chosen one of the two dishes to recreate, but I am not the person for a simple or an easy challenge – so I upped the game and went for both. The first photo in this post has four dishes in it – 2 Halloumi Souvlaki and 2 Lamb Souvlaki. Two are The Real Greek ones and two are my recreations. What do you think? How did I do?
And of course as I AM a perfectionist I also made a Greek Side Salad with Feta Cheese.
If you want to make Halloumi and Lamb Souvlaki with Greek Feta Salad at home I have the recipes here in the ‘Souvlaki The Real Greek Style’ post. Needless to say that even as I came very close to the original with the appearance (just a bit tinier as it’s quite hard to get the flatbread big enough); the biggest difference was in the taste of the lamb. I just was not able to recreate that clean, fresh and so mouthwateringly delicious taste of The Real Greek Lamb Gyro. For that you just must visit The Real Greek. But remember the print out the Westfield We Are Dining Offers from here.
This post was brought to you with Westfield London, but all thoughts, reviews and opinions are our own.
Photos: Marthafied