The 11 Best Marinades Using 5 Ingredients or Less

Hello, spring! We’re pulling our grill out of the garage and into the backyard this week, and cooking on it every chance we get until fall. Deciding what’s for dinner couldn’t be easier when I have these simple marinades in my arsenal. Each of these 10 best marinades is totally tasty on chicken, beef, or pork and has five ingredients or less (not counting salt and pepper).

As I’m cleaning up the breakfast dishes, I like to get a container with a lid or a gallon size zipper bag and put my meat and marinade in it and let it sit all day in the fridge. Even if you’re in a hurry to get out the door to work, YOU CAN DO THIS! It’s totally worth the five minutes of your time, because I know on the way home from work you’ll be super happy to not have to think, “What should I make for dinner when I get home??”

1. Easy 7-Up Marinade from Chef in Training uses 7-Up, garlic, horseradish, soy sauce, and oil.

10 Best Marinades Using 5 Ingredients or Less

2. Balsamic Marinade for Steak from Everyday Maven uses olive oil, balsamic vinegar, spicy brown mustard, salt, pepper, and parsley.

Balsamic Marinade for Steak from www.everydaymaven.com

3. Lime Chicken One-Minute Marinade Hack from Momtastic harnesses the power of the microwave to speed up a four-hour marinade into just a minute. Use this hack for any marinade—it’s a game changer.

4. Greek Chicken Marinade from Kalyn’s Kitchen uses oil, lemon, Greek seasoning, poultry seasoning, oregano, and pepper.

Very Greek Grilled Chicken found on KalynsKitchen.com

Head to the next page for more tasty marinades…

Karen Petersen is a cookbook author and food blogger at 365 Days of Slow Cooking. Mostly she writes about the new foods and recipes she's been making at her home for her husband and two children. She loves easy recipes that are full of flavor. She is a crockpot connoisseur and has created over 1000 slow cooker recipes in the past 5 1/2 years. She loves dessert more than anything else in the whole world and likes to plan it, make it, eat it, talk about it while eating it and then review it after it's gone. You can also visit Karen on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Google+, and Pinterest.