Grilled Vegetable Skewers
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Recipe courtesy of Alex Guarnaschelli

Grilled Vegetable Skewers with a Honey Soy Glaze

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  • Level: Easy
  • Total: 50 min
  • Active: 45 min
  • Yield: 4 to 6 servings

Ingredients

Directions

Special equipment:
twenty 5-1/2-inch-long sturdy wooden skewers, soaked in water for 10 to 15 minutes
  1. Make the glaze: Cook the honey in a medium saute pan over medium heat until golden brown and bubbly, 2 to 3 minutes. Remove the pan from the heat. Add the soy sauce, vinegar, pearl onions, scallions and lemon zest and juice. Return the pan to the heat, add 1/4 cup water and a pinch of salt and cook until the onions are tender and the sauce is reduced, 5 to 8 minutes. Remove the onions and let them cool. Keep the sauce warm.
  2. Skewer the vegetables: Start each skewer with a pearl onion followed by alternating 3 pieces pepper with 3 pieces zucchini and finishing with another pearl onion. Arrange the skewers in a single layer on a baking sheet.
  3. Cook the vegetables: Preheat the grill for cooking at medium-high heat.
  4. Brush the skewers with the olive oil and sprinkle with salt. Place the skewers in a single layer on the hottest part of the grill. Cook for 2 to 3 minutes, then turn them on the other side and move them to a slightly cooler part of the grill if they are getting overdone. Cook until the vegetables are tender, an additional 3 to 5 minutes.
  5. Transfer the skewers in a single layer to a large serving platter and spoon the glaze over them. Sprinkle with the sesame seeds and serve.

Cook’s Note

I like to make the honey-scallion mixture ahead of time and then just grill the vegetables when ready to eat. The "bite" from the scallions really brings out the flavor of the honey. The most important part of a skewer to get right is having everything cooked at the same time. To that end, I pick three vegetables that have a similar cooking time. Undercooked onions can ruin a skewer, for example, so I cook those a little, first, to better match the shorter cooking time of the other vegetables.