Grilled Scallops and Shrimp Kabobs are fantastic! The marinade is quick and easy to prepare. Toss your shrimp and scallops in for a quick swim and BAM! You have outstanding flavors that you, your family, or your guests are going to simply rave about!
Grilling seafood is often intimidating for some people, but it shouldn’t be. Seafood is just like any other protein.
The only difference is that it can often be a little more delicate, so you have to babysit it just a little bit more than say chicken or beef. Seafood cooks quicker and there is nothing worse than a rubbery overdone texture.
This grilled scallops and shrimp kabob recipe is really easy. It doesn’t take too long to prepare, with just a little planning you can pull this together. Another one of our favorites is these Lemon Garlic Shrimp Kabobs, it is a great easy recipe.
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12″ Natural Bamboo Skewers for BBQ
Marinade
The marinade combines olive oil, lemon and lime juice, garlic, salt and pepper, and a dash of cayenne for a little heat! Marinate the scallops and shrimp for about an hour in the refrigerator.
You need to be careful you don’t allow the scallops and shrimp to marinate too long, (like overnight). The acid in the lemon and lime juice will start to cook them and you may end up with an unintended ceviche.
Not that there is anything wrong with ceviche. But if you are looking to grill your scallops and shrimp that’s not the direction you want to go!
What Goes Well With Scallops and Shrimp?
You can pair this recipe with any number of sides for a complete meal. These would go well with pasta like linguine in an Alfredo sauce. A red or white wine sauce would be great too!
You could serve them over top of rice or risotto with some grilled vegetables on the side. We opted for a nice fresh green salad and it was excellent!
You could serve a single skewer as an appetizer if you are having a dinner party. Or if it is a more casual affair you could serve them with cocktails. Everyone could help themselves to a skewer, or two!
How do you know when scallops are cooked?
It is pretty easy to know when your shrimp are cooked. The outside turns a nice light shade of pink while the inside should be white. As with many types of seafood, you need to be careful not to overcook your shrimp.
Scallops, on the other hand, are a little tougher as they do not change color when they are cooked. They will remain white before, during, and after they are cooked, except for the grill marks of course. The secret is the texture of the scallop.
Look for the scallops to be opaque and still soft to the touch when perfectly cooked. If they are overcooked they will become rubbery.
A good rule of thumb for grilling scallops and shrimp is 3-5 minutes per side. The difficult part with this recipe is that you need to make sure that the shrimp is also cooked.
Starting with a hot preheated grill will help the cooking process. If your grill is not hot enough you will have to leave the skewers on the grill for too long to cook the shrimp. This will result in you overcooking the scallops.
Look for nice grill marks on both the shrimp and the scallops. You should only have to turn them once. Make sure you brush each side with some of the reserved marinades. This keeps them juicy and tender too!!
Then all you have to do is grab a seat and enjoy your grilled scallops and shrimp kabobs!
Grilled Scallops and Shrimp Kabobs
Ingredients
- 18 Scallops
- 18 Large shrimp
- ½ Cup olive oil
- 6 Tbsp lemon juice
- 6 Tbsp lime juice
- 1 Tbsp Garlic finely chopped
- ¼ tsp Lemon pepper
- 1 tsp Kosher salt
- ½ tsp Cayenne pepper
- Wooden skewers
Instructions
- Place your shrimp and scallops in a large Ziploc freezer bag.
- In a bowl combine all the other ingredients and stir until mixed.
- Pour ¾ of the marinade into the bag with shrimp and scallops, reserve ¼ of the marinade for basting while the skewers are on the grill.
- Place the bag in the refrigerator and allow the shrimp and scallops to marinate for 15-30 minutes, turning the bag occasionally.
- Soak your wooden skewers in water for at least 1 hour, remove and let dry on a paper towel.
- Drain and discard the marinade, thread the shrimp, and scallops on to the skewers alternating between them.
- Preheat your grill to medium-hot.
- Place the skewers on to the grill and grill each side for 3-5 minutes.
- Using the reserved marinade baste each side of the skewers.
- Grill until your shrimp are and pink and the scallops are opaque; you should have nice grill marks on both the shrimp and the scallops.
- Serve immediately.
excellent recipe although marinating for an hour pretty much cooks the shrimp so unfortunately they were both overcooked but flavors were excellent and I shall cook again! Next time I will marinate for 15 minutes and then brush them with the remainder sauce. I served them with skewers of sweet peppers and onions that also were roasted on the grill as well as with broccoli and cauliflower roasted in the oven. I served everything over cauliflower rice – delicious!
We reduced the marinate time to 15-30 minutes so that should work better.
With only one teaspoon of salt how can there be 846mg of sodium in the recipe?
The nutritional calculation is done automatically by Nutritionix. When I look at the sodium in the salt (2,325mg) and the lemon pepper (170mg) I calculate that the sodium content per serving would be approximately 415mg. I am not sure why the automated calculation is so much higher, I will put a note in the recipe and mention this. As always if you have nutritional or dietary requirements or restrictions you should always do your own nutritional calculations.
Thanks
You can lower the sodium content if you use Mrs Dash’s No salt lemon pepper
Yummilicious!!
Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it!