Fire Up the Grill With These Epic Marinades

Lemon, lime and orange walk into a marinade … and what comes out the other side is bright, punchy and fresh. Smoked paprika, cumin and Mexican oregano give it some backbone so it doesn't just taste like a glass of juice and the result is your neighbor asking you to bring it to every cookout for the rest of the summer. Consider yourself warned.

"Huli" means "turn" in Hawaiian, which tells you everything about how this chicken is meant to be cooked: keep flipping, keep basting and do not walk away from the grill. Pineapple juice, soy sauce, brown sugar, ginger and a little ketchup build a sticky, caramelized glaze that clings to every inch of the chicken and gets better with each pass over the flame.

Nine pantry staples, five minutes and zero trips to a specialty store, this is the marinade you make when you want maximum flavor without having to think too hard about it. Smoked paprika and chili powder bring the heat while brown sugar kicks up the caramelization. Toss it with chicken, steak, pork, seafood or veggies — this bad boy doesn’t discriminate.

This sounds like a dessert-bar accident but stay with it, because what happens on a hot grill is nothing short of a revelation. The coffee leans into the char, the cocoa adds a buttery richness that plays off the fat in the steak and a pinch of cayenne keeps everything from getting too comfortable.

Cumin, coriander, hot peppers, citrus and fresh mint layer into something savory and bright with just enough kick to make it interesting without clearing the room. It works on everything from thick cuts of meat to tomatoes straight off the vine and once you make it, you'll start eyeing everything in your kitchen wondering what else it can fix.

If you've never marinated with yogurt before, this is your moment and you're welcome in advance. The whole milk yogurt clings to the meat and the ginger, garam masala and cinnamon sink in deep, delivering a crust off the grill that's aromatic and complex. It's the dark horse of the marinade lineup and it wins every time.

This is the marinade that finally makes grilled vegetables the thing people fight over at the table instead of just politely eating around the steak. Balsamic vinegar, Dijon, honey and thyme come together into something savory-sweet that’s perfect for anything you have rolling around in your crisper drawer.

Lemon, garlic and fresh parsley coat prawns, scallops and white fish in something bright and clean. Ten minutes on the grill later you have a plate that looks like it came from somewhere with outdoor seating and a wine list. Easy-peasy lemon squeezy.

This chicken marinade locks in moisture the way a great '80s power ballad locked in that chest-clutching, sing-every-word feeling. Balsamic vinegar, Worcestershire, Dijon and brown sugar come together in five minutes flat and your chicken comes off the grill so ridiculously juicy that you'll wonder why you ever bought a bottle of Italian dressing and called it a marinade.

This one comes in with full-blown multitasking energy, pulling double duty as both a marinade and a sauce. Onion, ketchup, brown sugar, red wine vinegar and Worcestershire simmer down into something deeply savory with just enough heat from crushed red pepper to remind you this is cowboy territory.