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donair
< Turkish döner kebap
DCHP-2 (Oct 2016)
n. — Food
sliced meat cooked on an upright spit, served in pita bread with vegetables, sauces and seasoning (see Image 1).
Type: 5. Frequency — This is a fast food item found worldwide in many languages and locations, yet the names vary from place to place. The dish comes from the eastern mediterranean cuisine and its name can be derived from the Turkish words döner 'turning', kebab, the Greek gyro, or the Arabic sh(a)warma. The variant form donair, a phonetic respelling of Turkish döner, is found most commonly in Canada compared with other domains (see Chart 1).
See also COD-2, s.v. "donair", which is marked "N Amer.", and OED-3, s.v. "doner kebab".
See also COD-2, s.v. "donair", which is marked "N Amer.", and OED-3, s.v. "doner kebab".
Quotations
1977
Meet the doner kebab Raif Erdogan arrived in Canada about two years ago with a wife, a large, silver model of the astonishing doner kebab machine, and a dream. At first he had to shelve the doner kebab machine and his dream of opening a Turkish restaurant in Ottawa.
1978
More adventurous delegates went next door and sampled the Donairs, greasy Greek fast food with an afterburn.
1979
Out of the Maritimes a French Canadian is bringing a Greek food to challenge the ubiquitous North American hamburger.
Greco Donair, an all-beef concoction served with onions, tomatoes, parsley, secret seasoning and a sweet sauce, and wrapped in low-calorie Lebanese bread, will make its Ontario debut in Mississauga's Credit Woodland plaza in February.
1985
Donair, a Turkish term that means to twist, turn or rotate, refers both to the "sandwich" that is twisted into shape and the large cone of meat that cooks on an upright spit in the franchise outlet. Gauthier said the donair originated in Cyprus, then "rolled out about 20 years ago to London, England, of all places, where they have a slightly different name for it, a donair kebab."
2003
"People in town had probably never heard of a donair before, even myself," Todd says. "I'd never eaten one. Then I came in here and ate one and I love them. I probably eat three or four a week."
2011
Bonte Foods Ltd., which employs 140 people in Dieppe largely making donair and pizza products, is feeling the pinch, too.
References
- OED-3
- COD-2
Images
Image 1: A donair. Source: Wikimedia Commons. Photo: S. Wallroth
