At one of Michigan’s most beloved meat markets, customers can grab freshly made kebabs to take home — or if they’re really hungry, get them grilled on the spot. In this episode of Cooking in America, host Sheldon Simeon heads to the Detroit suburb of Dearborn to visit Dearborn Meat Market, owned by a fifth-generation Lebanese butcher named Sam Saad.
Saad emigrated to Detroit 42 years ago, and when he lost it all during the recession, he decided to go back to what he knew best, leading him to open what is now Dearborn’s busiest meat market. Besides breaking huge, halal-slaughtered cow carcasses down into cuts like New York strips and rib-eyes, the market also specializes in Lebanese-style meat skewers including beef kofta and chicken tawook.
For the market’s signature kofta, fresh beef is run through the meat grinder before being mixed with various seasonings, parsley, and onion, threaded onto metal skewers, and tossed onto the sizzling hot grill. Once it’s done, all that’s left to do is stuff the kofta inside pita bread and devour.
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