Turkey has backed off from an attempt at forcing kebab shops across Germany and the wider European Union to stick to its strict rules on how to make a doner kebab.

Hoping to give the kebab the same protected EU status as food heritage favourites such as the Neapolitan pizza and Spain’s serrano ham, Ankara acted to secure a "Traditional Speciality Guaranteed" label. The move sparked incredulity in Germany – often viewed as the home of the modern-day kebab – with the German food and agriculture ministry last year telling the BBC that it viewed the Turkish bid for the “traditional” classification "with some astonishment".

Germany's kebab industry watched on anxiously as eurocrats dealt with the delicate question of what are and are not acceptable ingredients in a doner, but this week it emerged that on September 23, Turkey's International Doner Federation (Udofed), facing a large number of objections, withdrew its application for the special designation.

Kebab traditionalists may not like the path the doner has taken in Germany, but they'll just have to live with it (Credit: BiiJii, cc-by-sa 4.0).

As the European Commission debated the merits of Turkey’s bid to protect the “classic doner kebab”, matters got spicy. Former German food and agriculture minister Cem Ozdemir, a politician of Turkish origin, was quoted as saying by the BBC that it was up to everyone to decide how a doner should be eaten in his country, with no requirement for guidelines from Ankara.

"The doner belongs to Germany," he declared.

In German cuisine, the high street doner has changed over the decades into forms of kebab that are very different than the original from Turkey.

The earliest known photo of a doner kebab stall, taken in Istanbul in 1855 (Credit: James Robertson, sofrabezi.net, public domain).

Turkey’s case to the EU was that the doner should be perceived as a Turkish national dish spread to Europe with the migration of Turks, but Berlin argued that kebabs as they have evolved in Germany have become part of the country’s own national cuisine.

The traditional way of cooking meat on a vertical rotisserie has 16th Century origins, according to the Turkish case for special treatment.

The rules that Udofed asked the EU to impose in line with the label would have meant, among other things, the banning of veal and turkey meat in kebabs, a stipulation that the meat be sliced to a thickness of 3-5mm and regulated marinades.

The German variant of a kebab often uses veal. It also typically comes in a flatbread with red cabbage, pickles and red onions, topped with sauces.

In Germany, there are more than 1.5mn Turkish citizens and nearly as many people of Turkish descent.

Around 60,000 people are employed in Germany’s kebab industry, producing about 400 tonnes of kebab a day, according to the Association of Turkish Doner Manufacturers in Europe (ATDID). Annual sales of kebabs generate revenues amounting to some €3.5bn across Europe, including €2.4bn in Germany alone, the association says.

Germany contended that the special labelling of kebabs would lead to big bureaucratic hurdles and higher prices for the popular street food.

Doner inflation has previously become an explosive cost-of-living issue among Germans ahead of elections.