Turkey applies to the EU for protected status for the doner kebab – but Germans protest it as an ‘assault on their cultural identity’

A new slice of history beckons for kebab lovers as Turkey and Germany rush to claim the famous rotisserie meat as their own.

Turkey has filed an application to have one of its best-known foods – the doner kebab – protected by the European Union but Germany is having none of it, reports The Times.

Turkey plans to register the name doner in Europe so that it can only be used by those conforming to the registered production method. If the nation gets its way, the kebab will be accorded the same protection as Italian Neapolitan pizza, Spanish serrano ham and French champagne. 

Although the seasoned meat originates in Istanbul, some argue it has also taken its place as a national snack in Germany, with around a third of Germans consuming a at least one kebab per month.

Critics have labelled the bizarre back and forth an outright ‘global food war’ while some have called it an ‘assault on Germany’s cultural identity’. 

Meanwhile Arif Keles from the Hisar Fresh Food kebab kiosk in Berlin told Stern magazine: ‘There is no doner in Turkey that is made the way we make it here’, wrote The Times.

The proposal is perhaps even more peculiar in its attempt to force all slices of meat in a doner kebab to have the exact same thickness.

Turkey has demanded that there should be very specific rules for how thin slices of doner meat should be, what the meat should consist of, and that there should be a ‘certain standard’ to its production. 

If the entire proposal goes through the three-month process, it would mean that there will be an EU standard for what can be called doner a kebab – something that restaurants and stores across Europe will then have to live up to. 

Only large slabs of beef and lamb ‘horizontally sliced into cutlets with a thickness of 3 to 5mm’ could be labelled as doner, while chicken cutlets can be between one to two cm thick in the poultry variety.

Doner kebabs, the classic meat dish, consist of thinly sliced cutlets from beef, lamb, or chicken, rotating on a stainless steel skewer over a fire, cooking the meat as it revolves vertically around its axis.

Before being placed on the skewer, the meat is marinated in a mixture of yoghurt, pepper, tomato puree, herbs, spices and salt.

According to local media, one of the reasons Turkey wants the EU to protect the kebab is to preserve tradition as the dish has evolved throughout its journey into Europe.

According to Turkey’s application, a third contender for doner naming rights could be Greece (Stock image)

The doner economy in Europe is estimated to be worth a staggering €3.5billion (£2.9billion), according to the Association of Turkish Döner Producers in Europe.

Although they are somewhat associated with the EU’s protected designation of origin quality scheme, traditional specialties are not included in the geographical indications framework – which offers the highest level of protection for foodstuffs across Europe, Euronews reports.

This enhanced level of protection is given to products with a direct link to a geographical area, which is not the case for the traditional cooking technique of doner meat.

It is also the reason why Parma ham has been granted geographical indications, while jamon serrano has only been offered protected status.

The food specialty label has sparked previous controversy, including when the use of the traditional term ‘prosek’ for a Croatian dessert wine was challenged by Italians as it sounded too similar to the Italian’s Prosecco.

In terms of Turkey’s doner however, complaints could also arise from neighbour and cultural rival, Greece.

‘It is claimed that Greece was the first country in Europe where ‘Döner’ was introduced during an exchange of people between Turkey and Greece in 1922. In Greece, it has been named ‘gyro’,’ says the application by Turkey.

A tense consultation phase has now been opened and will last for three months where countries will be able to challenge the application.

The application has split opinions, with some hailing the move as a positive step, and others questioning the origin of the dish.