Dumb and Dumber is a great movie. I am not sure why, but I still crack up, out loud, whenever I say "Well, g'day mate. Let's put a little shrimp on the barbie". Ha. Apparently, I giggle even when I type it. (I'm easily amused)
This recipe is a combination of a shrimp grill marinade I found online, and a veggie grill marinade from a Giada de Laurentiis cookbook. I used them both separately, and then decided I liked them better combined.
Now I am going to share with you a little lesson I like to call, "how to improvise". This recipe calls for red wine vinegar. Now, I have been adding to my pantry for years, and I don't have any red wine vinegar laying around. I have rice vinegar, white vinegar, cider vinegar, distilled vinegar, and balsamic vinegar. No red wine vinegar. In fact, I have not personally come across another recipe that calls for red wine vinegar (or at least a recipe I would use on a regular basis).
Instead of freaking out, I just decided that red wine vinegar, in my head, tastes like a combination of balsamic and white vinegar. Who knows if this is actually true. But I tried it, the marinade works, and I guess I don't really know the difference. Some day, I will have to actually try red wine vinegar and see if I'm right.
The point is: although I mostly cook things from the ingredients I already have laying around, sometimes I want to get outside of my comfort zone and try something new. Sometimes, this means not having one of the ingredients, but you find a way to make it work. You don't have crushed pineapple? Use honey. You don't have honey? Use sugar. Once you realize you just need to make something sweet, not actually to taste like pineapple, you become better at the improv.
Cheesy Factor (1 no cheese, 10 all cheese): Zilch
Time Factor (1 shortest, 10 longest): 3
Dummy Factor (1 easiest, 10 hardest): 1
Grill Marinade
3 cloves garlic, minced
1/3 cup olive oil
1/4 cup tomato sauce
2 Tbl red wine vinegar
2 Tbl chopped fresh basil (or 2 tsp dried basil)
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
* I recommend this with shrimp, zucchini, mushrooms, grape tomatoes, and red onions
Mix everything up in a bowl with a whisk. Pour 1/2 into ziploc bag with shrimp, other half into a ziploc bag with veggies. Marinate in fridge for as long as you have time for. Then skewer shrimp, skewer veggies, and grill away. Use the left-over marinade that was in veggie bag as a baste while grilling also.
