10 Easy Recipes For A Memorial Day Cookout

May is almost here which means summer is almost here. The first big opportunity of the summer to have a cookout with your friends or family is Memorial Day. If you’re already daydreaming about a picnic and grass between your toes here are easy recipes you can include in this years Memorial cookout.

1. Grilled Jerk Shrimp and Pineapple Skewers

Nothing says summer quite like good seafood and pineapple. These skewers are the best of both worlds. There’s a lot of jerk marinates you can use when making yours. Typically a good marinate includes things like allspice, nutmeg, thyme and green peppers. The sweetness from the pineapple will compliment the spicy shrimp, a perfect appetizer.

2. Red, White, and Blue Deviled Eggs

If you’re feeling particularly patriotic this Memorial Day consider making your deviled eggs appetizer red, white and blue. All you need to make these eggs colorful is a little bit of food dye. Soak your egg in a mixture of vinegar, water and food dye. The eggs will soak the dye right up so these don’t need to soak very long before you get the colors you want. After that continue making your eggs the way you normally would!

3. Homemade Potato Chips

What’s a cookout without potato chips? If you want to take this cookout staple a step further consider making your own potato chips. There is a variety of potato chip flavors you can make to compliment your burgers and hot dogs. You can be classic and make simple salted potato chips or be adventurous parmesan roasted chips. Regardless of what you decide these are easy recipes to follow.

4. Potato Salad

Another one that is on the list of easy recipes to make is homemade potato salad. This is a timeless dish that truly exemplifies an All-American cookout or picnic. Potato salad is a simple but classic recipe that is not hard in the slightest to make.

5. BBQ Onion Steaks

If you’re someone who doesn’t eat meat or you’re just trying to be healthier at the annual Memorial Day cookout BBQ onion steaks are the way to go. These will compliment your burger or can replace your burger entirely. You’ll be surprised how delicious these BBQ onion steaks actually are.

6. Black Bean Burgers

Black bean burgers are fantastic even if you eat meat. You can prepare these as is and and serve them after being heated in the microwave or you can use a grill to get that added flavor. These meatless burgers aren’t lacking anything, in fact one could argue that they’re even better than beef patties. It should take you anywhere from 20 to 30 minutes.

7. Sweet Tea

You can’t have a Memorial Day cookout with just water so consider making some true sweet tea. You can make a pitcher of sweet tea with the sugar already added to truly recreate the classic southern sweet tea. Or you can leave it unsweetened and let your guests add as much sugar as they want. Bringing a pitcher of sweet tea will make everyone at the cookout grateful.

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8. Red, White, and Blue Sangria

If you’re looking for a drink with more of a kick consider sangria. It is not only refreshing but it will make your day a little more fun. To get the patriotic aspect of the drink add strawberries and blueberries to the normal sangria recipe.

9. Dipped Rice Krispie Treats

You can’t have a cookout without dessert. What’s great about this recipe is that it looks professionally made but isn’t hard to make at all. The fact that this dessert also isn’t messy and won’t drip all over your outfit the way melted ice cream would make it even more appealing.

10. Pies In A Jar

Pies in a jar is definitely an out of the box recipe that will impress everyone else at the cookout. This recipe may look intimidating but it’s actually very easy. It’s also a great recipe to make sure that everyone is happy because you can make a variety of pies. Plus tiny mason jars are very cute.