How Long to Marinate Chicken (and All Meat) for Maximum Flavor
Marinating meat is like stretching. Stretching is important. You know, before going for a run or playing in your coed rec soccer league that you definitely don’t take too seriously. (Sarah needs to pick up the slack though. Everyone’s been talking about it. We shouldn’t have lost to the Lightning Bolts. Just saying.) But you can actually stretch too much, and when you do, your muscles get all messed up. The same goes for meat. You can marinate chicken, steak, pork, and lamb for too long. And the meat doesn’t like that at all.
Generally speaking, you shouldn’t marinate meat for more than a day. Yeah, probably shorter than you thought. For some reason, people (more specifically, dads) find some kind of perverse satisfaction in making declarations like, “These steaks have been marinating for five days.” Maybe it’s impressive? Maybe it shows a misplaced commitment to the meat? We’re not sure, but we can certainly say that it’s not doing those steaks any favors.
Marinades usually consist of some type of sugar, salt, and acid, along with a variety of other flavor enhancers. Salt and sugar both break down muscle fibers to some degree (in the same way a brine does), but acid is the real culprit in this scenario. We like a little bit of tenderizing with meat, but when your chicken thighs are exposed to lemon juice, lime juice, yogurt, or vinegars for too long, the texture of the meat turns from tender to mushy and stringy, two words that have never been used in tandem to describe something pleasant.
At the heart of this this whole overexposure is a common misconception about marinating. The point of marinating isn’t to get flavor into the center of the meat. In fact, a marinade will never really penetrate much past the surface of the meat—and that's OK! The purpose of a marinade is to be the first thing that cooks when the meat hits the pan or grill. The heat develops the flavors of the salt, sugar, and acid in the marinade and helps to create a nicely caramelized crust. You can definitely develop big flavor on the outer layer of the meat this way, but it will never truly reach the center of the protein.
Regardless of what type of protein dinner happens to be, make sure to keep your marinating period under 24 hours. And when we say under 24 hours, we’re also talking way under 24 hours. Marinating chicken, lamb, pork, or steak for just 15 or 20 minutes actually makes a huge difference. And now you know what to do. Marinate responsibly. And live with perfectly textured, flavorful meat for the rest of your days.
Want to go for crispy instead of marinated? We have that too.
One-Skillet Roasted Sesame Chicken Thighs
