Kebabs, more specifically Doner kebabs, are grilled strips of reconstituted goat marinaded in chilli grease. This 'meat' is served in a warmed (not toasted - if it is, send it back) pitta bread doused with brightly-coloured chilli sauce and occaisonally covered with chopped-up bits of vegetable. If it is possible, forego the vegetables. They might be slightly healthier than the 25% fat of the kebab but they take ages to eat, get all over your clothes and ensure that the kebab proper is cold by the time you've cleared a path to it. The whole thing can be eaten by dislocating your jaw enough to fit enough of the thing into your mouth to take a bite or by sacrificing the cleanliness of one hand and eating the meat strip by strip. When enough has been removed to enable a bite to be taken without risk to mandible or clothing, eat as you would any other thing.

Kebabs are sold from a range of shops in every country except America, where they are burnt in the street by fundamentalist health freaks. Quality of the meat is invariably good but strength of the chilli sauce is sometimes overlooked in favour of making it an attractive colour. Prices vary wildly; major cities see fit to charge upwards of four whole entire pounds for their idea of a 'large' doner whilst the same thing only twice as big can be bought in smaller settlements for half the price.

Unfortunately, kebabs cannot yet be made in the comfort of the home. Some 24-hour shops may try to fob you off with a pre-cooked reheatable kebab-shaped lump of polystyrene - spurn these things as you would spurn a rabid frog. They taste of a kebab that's been left out in the rain for a month and dryed out in the spin cycle of a washing machine. Proper kebabs should be fresh, though the age of the strange thing from which the meat is wrought (the Elephant's Leg) is one of the ineffable mysteries of our world.

Other styles of kebab are available but I'm unqualified to speak of them. Chicken kebabs actually look as if they contain chicken, whereas Doners are somehow safer to eat because they look as if they contain the mysterious Spicèd Mushbeast. It shelters in its anonymity. I'm aware of the dangers of badly-cooked chicken but do not know what's in a Doner that I should fear. Other kebabs come on sticks, rather like a heart surgeon's nightmare version of pineapple/cheese cocktail stick things. Whether they give you the stick or not I don't know. It might be dangerous when combined with beer. I expect they put it in a pitta for you. Killjoys. Remember not to wear white when eating kebabs. Chilli sauce will show up on anything but at night only white will be noticed.