We compare Yorkshire’s ‘best’ kebab shops that are right next door to each other

The British kebab is no longer a thin bread bag filled with greasy slices of dubious meat, limp lettuce and chilli sauce so hot you can’t taste the other three things.

Our adaptation of this Middle Eastern street food has come along significantly since the days of the dirty doner. Eating a kebab in public in Britain is no longer the stigmatised preserve of the inebriated.

Great kebabs – from a Pakistani-style chicken tikka kebab in a naan to a Greek-style pork gyros in a pitta – can be found on most decent high streets these days. But which purveyor of these rotated meats in bread envelopes prepares the best one?

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We heard on good authority that Nusret Shawarma, in Manningham Lane, Bradford, and Istanbul Shawarma next door were two of Yorkshire’s best. How handy. But which is the best of the best?

We sent eating fan Dave and his mate Benjamin to find out.

The rules: one lamb shawarma and one chicken shawarma from each cafe-cum-takeaway. We tried to get buy equivalent products but owing to a communication breakdown between Benjamin and myself, our success was qualified.

Wait. What’s shawarma? Imagine a doner kebab except made from leaner meat, usually of better provenance. Shawarma, which refers to the slices of meat cooked on a vertical rotating grill, can be eaten in a pitta or flatbread or alone with chips.

Alongside falafel, it is the most common street food in the Middle East. Sellers usually add pickles, diced salad and condiments such as hummus, tahini (a sesame paste) and amba (a mango relish).

These condiments are less common in Britain although hummus was available at Istanbul and amba was available at Nusret. Yoghurt, chilli and garlic sauces were also offered.

Exhibit One: Nusret’s lamb shawarma

First of all, none of the four kebabs we tried were poor. They were all, in fact, very good; a kaleidoscopic meeting of succulent, marinaded meat, crunchy salad and pickles, all pepped up with tangy sauces, inside fresh spongy bread.

This was Benjamin’s favourite with a spongy, almost naan-like flatbread, pickled red cabbage, a bit of salad and garlic, yoghurt and mint and chilli sauces. This was mildly controversial as Dave found the lamb a bit chewy.

Exhibit Two: Nusret’s chicken shawarma

Lots of lovely marinaded chicken slices in another of those superb flatbreads. Benjamin felt the above three sauces didn’t work as well as they did with the lamb but it was hardly a flavour clash. Dave marginally preferred this to the lamb variant.

Exhibit Three: Istanbul’s lamb shawarma

Here was where we messed up a bit. Due to his inability to communicate, Dave at Istanbul Shawarma bought his shawarma in pittas while poorly instructed Benjamin next door bought his in flatbreads. You can have either at either joint. Both variants were fresh and pillowy, although Dave marginally preferred the pittas but it’s a matter of personal taste.

No chewy lamb here. It was tender, if not as moist as the version from Nusret. A wodge of crunchy salad, a chunk of pickled mango, some hummus and some non-traditional pickled jalapeño slices raised this just above Nusret’s, making it Dave’s winner.

Benjamin preferred the Nusret version but it may have been because greedy get Dave didn’t give him enough to sample.

Exhibit Four: Istanbul’s chicken shawarma

Again Benjamin preferred the Nusret chicken but by the slimmest of margins. Essentially, it was like the Istanbul lamb one above but easier to digest. Lamb is notoriously hard to digest, hence why we eat it with mint sauce.

The verdict

So which was ‘better’? Well, Dave preferred the kebabs from Istanbul while Benjamin leaned towards the kebabs from Nusret, both by the slimmest of margins. That’s not very helpful, Dave and Benjamin.

OK. OK. We both agree you can go to either and enjoy a very, very good kebab. The rest is really about personal preferences. I thought about grading them but it seemed pointless given our minuscule, nay meta differences of opinion.

One thing of note was the price: £4 per kebab, which at a time when everything costs too much, is astonishing value. So, whatever you’re having for lunch, give it to someone else (or the dog) and get yourself a kebab from either Istanbul Shawarma or Nusret Shawarma.

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