This is one of the best lemon hen marinade we’ve tried. Use our simple marinade for tremendous tender, juicy, and flavorful hen. You should use it on quite a lot of hen cuts and cooking strategies, together with baking, grilling, or cooking in a skillet.
This tremendous versatile lemon garlic hen marinade is ideal for all cuts of hen. We’ve been utilizing this marinade for a very long time (initially impressed by these scrumptious lemon hen thighs). Whereas it’s excellent for hen, it’s additionally scrumptious with pork, fish, and greens.
We’ve used it in lots of our hen recipes, together with these lemon garlic hen breasts, juicy grilled hen, and garlic parmesan wings. For extra inspiration, attempt our Greek hen marinade, which provides plain Greek yogurt to make the hen further tender and juicy.
Key Components
- Lemon: I take advantage of recent lemon juice and zest. Lemon juice makes the bottom of the marinade, whereas the zest offers it an additional lemony punch. I like utilizing a vegetable peeler to make strips of the zest.
- Olive oil: I like the flavour of olive oil on this marinade. It makes the hen extra scrumptious. In the event you plan to cook dinner your hen over excessive warmth, take into account substituting it with avocado oil.
- Dijon mustard: Mustard and lemon work fantastically collectively, so I at all times add slightly Dijon to this marinade.
- Garlic: Smashed entire garlic cloves add the correct amount of recent garlic taste and stability the acidity of the lemon. Preserving them entire additionally prevents any garlic from burning afterward.
- Recent herbs: These are optionally available, however I like including recent herbs to this hen marinade. I take advantage of recent parsley within the video, however dill, cilantro, and basil are wonderful selections.
How Lengthy to Marinate Hen
Making your marinade is straightforward! Merely stir all of the elements in a bowl, season with salt and pepper, and use it inside 2 hours.
Since this marinade incorporates lemon juice, don’t marinate your hen for longer than 6 hours. The acidity of the lemon juice can break down the hen’s proteins, leading to a mushy texture if left within the marinade for too lengthy. All the time marinate your hen within the fridge and discard any leftover marinade to make sure meals security.
- Boneless hen breasts: I often marinate hen breasts between half-hour and a pair of hours.
- Bone-in hen: Hen thighs, bone-in hen breasts, and drumsticks can deal with a bit extra time. Marinate for as much as 6 hours.
For extra marinade recipes, see our Greek hen marinade, simple shrimp marinade, or this unbelievable steak marinade!
Straightforward Lemon Hen Marinade
We love this lemon garlic hen marinade! This recipe makes sufficient marinade for two to three kilos of hen. It really works nice for hen, however you too can use it for turkey, pork, fish, shrimp, tofu, and greens.
Be happy to make use of the marinade for basting whereas cooking or grilling. Simply bear in mind to put aside a portion of the marinade earlier than including your elements in the event you plan to baste.
Makes 1/2 cup
Watch Us Make the Recipe
You Will Want
2 lemons
2 tablespoons (30ml) olive oil
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
1/4 teaspoon crimson pepper flakes, or extra to style
1/2 teaspoon recent floor pepper
1/2 teaspoon fantastic sea salt
3 cloves garlic, smashed
1/4 cup chopped recent parsley, optionally available
Instructions
1Use a vegetable peeler to peel the zest of 1 lemon, then juice the lemons so you could have 1/4 cup (60ml) of juice.
2Whisk the lemon juice, olive oil, mustard, crimson pepper flakes, salt, and black pepper collectively in a small bowl till the salt has dissolved.
3Stir within the garlic, lemon zest, and parsley (if utilizing).
4Place the hen within the marinade, after which transfer it round a couple of instances to make sure it’s nicely coated. Refrigerate for as much as 6 hours or 2 hours for boneless hen breasts.
Adam and Joanne’s Suggestions
- Recent herbs: I like parsley, however dill, cilantro, and basil are additionally pretty.
- Marinating time: Because of the acidic nature of the lemon juice, we advocate marinating hen for not than 6 hours. In the event you’re marinating fish, half-hour or much less is satisfactory.
- To show right into a salad dressing: Improve the olive oil to 1/4 cup and whisk till blended. Refrigerate for 1 hour, then discard the garlic and lemon zest. Style for seasoning and alter with salt. Add a sprinkle of sugar or slightly honey to stability the acidity and the mustard.
- The diet information supplied under are estimates.
Diet Per Serving
Serving Dimension
1/4 cup
/
Energy
138
/
Protein
1 g
/
Carbohydrate
4 g
/
Dietary Fiber
0 g
/
Complete Sugars
1 g
/
Complete Fats
14 g
/
Saturated Fats
2 g
/
Ldl cholesterol
0 mg
