It can be difficult to know how to properly marinate your dinner, especially with so many different recipes out there! But, you don’t need to worry anymore because we’re here to teach you how to marinate steak, chicken, and pork so you can get the most out of your dinner.
Marinade Tips
If you’re thinking about marinating your meat, there are some tips you should follow and know.
What You’ll Need
To make a perfect marinade what you’ll need are three main things: acidity so you can tenderize your meat, flavoring so nothing is bland, and some type of oil so that your meat won’t get dried out as you’re marinating it!
Quick Reminders
- Don’t let your meat soak in marinade longer than is recommended because you could really turn it mushy.
- Try to avoid putting a lot of salt in your marinade because salt has the tendency to dry out meat.
- Refrigerate your meat to let it marinate.
- Do not marinate your food at room temperature because the marinade is picking up bacteria from the raw meat. Keep your marinating meat in the fridge or freezer.
- Some great examples of citric foods that will help tenderize the meat are citrus juices, vinegar, and wine.
- Avoid marinating in metal containers or in tinfoil because a chemical reaction could occur that will spoil the meat.
- If you’re looking to make a marinade then you should try and make more than you’ll need. You want the meat to soak in half of the marinade and you can use the excess marinade to baste so you’ll have extra flavoring!
Steak
We’ve covered a few different steak marinade recipes for you to try and we’ve given you our favorite steak marinade recipe as well, but there are a few tips you should know if you’re looking into how to marinate steak.
- Basil, oregano, garlic, and thyme are great herbs to use for a steak marinade.
- You can freeze marinated steak if you so choose in order to make for easier meal prep. Freezing tends to halt the marinating process so you won’t wind up with over-marinated food, but you’d be best not to leave your meat in the freezer for too long.
- When you’re safely thawing out your steak you want to place it in the fridge. Depending on how long you’ve had the steak in the freezer, it might take about 36 hours for it to properly thaw out in the refrigerator.
- Marinated steak can be kept safely in the fridge for about five days.
Some of the classic steak marinade recipes would be ones like lemon-oregano steak marinade or a nice ginger and sesame steak marinade. There are lots of ways that you can play around with steak marinades and the creativity is in your hands!
Chicken
If you’re interested in the best chicken marinade or a few chicken marinade recipes that you can try, we’ve covered that before! But, if you’ve never marinated chicken before or need to brush up on some facts, here are some quick tips for you on how to marinate chicken.
- Parsley, thyme, rosemary, garlic, and lemon are great ingredients to use for a chicken marinade.
- Two hours is roughly enough time for your chicken to marinate, though you can keep the marinated chicken in the fridge anywhere from 45 minutes to 3 1/2 hours.
- Marinated chicken can be safely kept in the refrigerator for two days.
- There are some chicken marinade recipes out there that you can freeze for as long as thee months. Though, like all meat, you want to make sure that you thaw them out in the fridge. You can leave your chicken in the fridge to thaw for about eight hours depending on how long the pieces have been frozen. Otherwise, the chicken will thaw out in just a few hours in the fridge.
Some of the most classic chicken marinades would be ones like a garlic and herb marinade or one of the more popular ones like a lemon chicken marinade that’s also mixed with mustard and garlic!
Pork
If you’re looking for the best pork tenderloin marinade then look no further than the recipe we’ve provided! But it never hurts to refresh your memory on some quick tips on how to marinate pork.
- Cumin, sage, thyme, and garlic are all great herbs to use in a pork marinade.
- When you’re marinating pork you can leave pork to season for up to 12 hours. Though, if you don’t have that kind of time, you can marinate pork for as little as three hours. Unlike other meats like poultry, pork is one of those meats that can be marinated for a longer period of time so don’t worry about leaving it for 12 hours!
- Marinated pork can be stored in the fridge for up to five days.
- There are some pork marinade recipes out there and marinated pork can stay in the freezer for nine months.
- Pork can take about a day to thaw out safely in the fridge.
A few of the well-loved pork marinades would be ones like a pineapple pork marinade or if you want to kick things up a notch you can try out this spicy pork marinade. Remember that you can also use beef and chicken marinades for your pork as those will work perfectly too!
There you go! Those are some basic tips for how to marinate steak, chicken, and pork. Be sure to check out our recipes and get cooking!