This 20 minute honey garlic shrimp is a reader favorite recipe. It’s extra quick, very simple, and delivers big flavor. Served with brown rice and vegetables or over a salad, this healthy dish is sure to join your regular dinner rotation.
Are you looking for a super quick, yet flavorful dinner this week? We have it right here for you. This saucy shrimp owes a lot of its flavor to a bold marinade of honey, soy sauce, and garlic, which is music to everyone’s taste buds. For a little extra flavor, we add some minced fresh ginger, but that’s entirely optional.
Video Tutorial
Tell Me About This Honey Garlic Shrimp
- Flavor: The marinade is loaded with flavor, but our favorite part of this dish is the beautiful caramelized bits of honey and garlic stuck to the pan and edges of the shrimp. Scrape it all up to serve because you don’t want to miss those flavorful bites.
- Ease: Regardless of your skill level, this is a very easy dinner recipe. Prepare the marinade, use half for marinating the shrimp, then use the rest as the sauce for cooking the shrimp. It’s convenient that the marinade is also the sauce—we do this for our maple sesame salmon and honey garlic salmon recipes too.
- Time: The shrimp takes 5 minutes to cook on the stove, while the marinating takes another 15. You’ll have this unbelievably tasty and simple meal on your table in about 20 minutes.
Choosing the Right Ingredients for Honey Garlic Shrimp
- Shrimp. You can use fresh or frozen raw shrimp. Thaw the shrimp completely before starting. Be sure to peel and devein the shrimp first. You can leave the tails on or remove if desired. If using already cooked shrimp, see recipe note below.
- Honey + garlic + soy. This marinade/sauce is packed with so much glorious flavor and is inspired by some wonderful flavors often used in Asian cuisine. (We also LOVE this honey soy glazed salmon from Omnivore’s Kitchen.)
- Green onions. This optional garnish adds freshness and a nice color contrast.
Overview: How to Make 20 Minute Honey Garlic Shrimp
The full printable recipe is below, but let’s walk through it so you understand each step before you get started.
- Make your marinade.
- Marinate the shrimp. Combine marinade and shrimp and marinate for at least 15 minutes or up to 8-12 hours. We usually only marinate it for about 15 minutes and during this time, you could prepare your side dishes such as steamed vegetables and instant brown rice.
- Cook the shrimp. Cook shrimp in a little olive oil, then flip and pour in the remaining sauce until cooked through.
- Garnish. Top with green onions and serve.
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20 Minute Honey Garlic Shrimp
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 5 minutes
- Total Time: 20 minutes
- Yield: serves 4
- Category: Dinner
- Method: Cooking
- Cuisine: American
Description
This 20 minute honey garlic shrimp is a reader favorite recipe. It’s extra quick, very simple, and delivers big flavor. Served with brown rice and vegetables or over a salad, this healthy dish is sure to join your regular dinner rotation.
Ingredients
- 1/3 cup honey
- 1/4 cup soy sauce (we usually use reduced sodium)
- 2 garlic cloves, minced (or 1 teaspoon jarred minced garlic)
- optional: 1 teaspoon minced fresh ginger
- 1 lb medium uncooked shrimp, peeled & deveined
- 2 teaspoons olive oil
- optional for garnish: chopped green onion
Instructions
- Whisk the honey, soy sauce, garlic, and ginger (if using) together in a medium bowl. You will use half for the marinade in step 2 and half for cooking the shrimp in step 3.
- Place shrimp in a large sealable container or zipped-top bag. Pour 1/2 of the marinade/sauce mixture on top, give it all a shake or stir, then allow shrimp to marinate in the refrigerator for 15 minutes or for up to 8-12 hours. Cover and refrigerate the rest of the marinade for step 3. (Time-saving tip: while the shrimp is marinating, we usually steam broccoli and microwave some quick brown rice.)
- Heat olive oil in a skillet over medium-high heat. Place shrimp in the skillet. (Discard used marinade.) Cook shrimp on one side until pink, about 45 seconds, then flip shrimp over. Pour in remaining marinade/sauce and cook it all until shrimp is cooked through, about 1-2 more minutes.
- Serve shrimp with cooked marinade sauce and a garnish of green onion. The sauce is excellent on brown rice and steamed vegetables on the side.
Notes
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Glass Mixing Bowls | Skillet
- Thicken the sauce? Some readers add 1 teaspoon of cornstarch to the second half of the sauce that will be used for cooking in step 3. This thickens the sauce so it isn’t as watery. To do this, use a fork to mix 1 teaspoon of cornstarch with 1 teaspoon warm water. Once cornstarch has dissolved, stir this into the sauce before using it in step 3.
- Garlic: If using fresh garlic that you mince yourself, use 2 cloves. If using refrigerated jarred minced garlic, use 1 teaspoon (or more, to taste).
- Shrimp: You can remove the tail or leave it on. We recommend using fresh shrimp, but you can use frozen. Thaw before marinating and cooking. If using frozen cooked shrimp, thaw, marinate, and cook as directed. You’ll really just be heating the shrimp up in the sauce.
- Consuming leftover marinade is a debated topic. While you could boil it to rid any contamination, the flavor could possibly change. Do what you’d like. In this recipe we only use half of the sauce for the marinade so we have more for cooking. (We discard the used marinade in step 3.)
Keywords: honey garlic shrimp
So delicious!! I made the sauce with ground ginger as I didn’t have fresh and also added in a teaspoon of chili sauce in a skillet. I put the entire amount of sauce and cooked until garlic was softened. I only had cooked shrimp so I stirred them into the thickened sauce (with cornstarch slurry) at the end to heat through and coat. Served over rice with broccoli. Couldn’t be easier or more delicious! I may reduce the amount of honey next time but will definitely make again! Thank you for sharing this recipe.
★★★★★
Delicious!! Very tasty. I added cilantro instead of scallions…very tasty. Thank you
★★★★★
Quick and very delicious!! I have made this countless times. I add two thawed cubes of Trader Joe’s frozen ginger. I also add chopped peanuts or cashews as a garnish along with the scallions. To keep it from being too salty, I always use the reduced sodium soy sauce. Like others, I usually double the sauce because my husband loves extra for his rice. I use Wondra for thickening the sauce and I sprinkle it directly into the pan. This goes well with steamed broccoli and brown rice. This is very simple. Anyone can make it. I highly recommend it. Thanks again, Sally, for another fantastic recipe!!
★★★★★
Super quick and easy dinner! My Family and I ate it on top of a spinach salad with onion, bell pepper, tomato, and ranch dressing. It was very tasty, and we will definitely be making it again!
★★★★★
I’m trying it for the first time tonight! I’ve never cooked shrimp before either, so really hoping they turn out delicious!
I had 2lbs of frozen big shrimp and I feel as if I should have doubled the sauce? But I’ll let ya know thank you for your cooking wisdom!
Hi Kennae! If you’re using twice the amount of shrimp, we would double the sauce recipe as well. Hope it’s a hit!
I loved this recipe, so simple but so good! I doubled the marinade recipe and thickened the sauce with cornstarch. Served over white rice and broccoli, topped with green onions.. in my opinion it was perfect! Next time I’m going to add in some fresh mushrooms!
★★★★★
I made the dish last night and doubled the sauce to put over pasta. At first I thought I was going to have to use corn starch to thicken it but decided not to and it was fabulous. The dish is a keeper. It’s even better using a few red pepper flakes. Thanks for that recipe.
Thanks for the red pepper flakes suggestion. I am going to try that next time I make this recipe!
★★★★★
I have not made this recipe but I am tonight….is there enough sauce sauce to put over pasta. Thanks
Hi Alan! The recipe doesn’t make a ton of extra sauce – you could perhaps double the sauce to serve over pasta. Let us know what you try!
It’s Friday night. We’re lazy and too fat. Was going to order in pizza when I remembered the big shrimp I bought at Costco. This dish is amazing. Simple ingredients and we had them in romaine lettuce leaves lined with rice, cucumber, red pepper strips and carrot. Oh. My. Goodness. Soooooo delicious and we are less fat because we didn’t order in greasy fatty carby food. Thanks my Baking Maven. Now double duty Cooking Maven. ❤️❤️
★★★★★
I use all the marinade- I heat it in a pan on the side. I feel it is hot enough that there should be no health issues, and have made the recipe often. It is delicious and can’t be beat for ease of prep. Thanks, Sally!
Can the shrimp sit in the marinade for 24 hours? After I prepped everything this afternoon and my husband came and wants to go out for dinner. Was hoping I could make it the following night?
★★★★★
Hi Katie, We don’t recommend letting it marinate for that long as it will change the texture of your shrimp.
Tried this tonight, and it was great! I was thinking about doubling the marinade. Would that change anything as far as cooking time? Did you use a cast iron skillet? I noticed your shrimp appeared more seared than mine. Thank you!
Glad to hear this one was a hit! You can double the marinade if you’d like — it shouldn’t make much of a difference with the cooking time. We used a regular skillet for this recipe. Hope this helps!
This was great – always looking for another shrimp recipe. It would absolutely be good as written, but after reading a bunch of the comments, I did add a little worcestershire and a fair amount of pepper flakes (kids are grown – we can eat the way we like). This is a keeper with or without the additions. I’m so happy I found this site!
★★★★★
Made this for my 6 year old. He absolutely loved this meal.
Great dish! Added the ginger and some red pepper flakes! Love this!
★★★★★
This recipe was so quick, EASY, and tasty!!! I didn’t even have to leave my house for ingredients! Definitely will be my new go to for protein and veggie!
This recipe is delicious! I’m curious why the sauce used to marinate needs to be thrown out. Can’t it be cooked along with the shrimp and eaten?
Hi Liz, using leftover marinade is debated from a food safety standpoint. While you could cook it with the shrimp, it’s questionable if it’s safe to eat after that short amount of time. Sometimes I boil it on the stove in a saucepan separately. It reduces down and cooks for longer and it’s never been an issue.
Our family loved this recipe! Thanks so much
★★★★★
Making this recipe for the third time. Each time I make it, everyone is complaining there wasn’t enough so tonight I’m making 2 lbs shrimp!
A definite favorite at my dinner table.
Cornstarch slurry a must as all the sauce sticks right to those delicious prawns!
This is fabulous. Have made it several times love the sweet from the honey and then contrast of the Worcestershire!!
Worcestershire? Did you add that to this recipe or are you responding g to another. 😉
This was an excellent dish, I added ginger and garlic powder to give that extra punch and it worked. Also added pepper to curve the sweetness
So good! I added cornstarch to the sauce and threw in broccoli and pineapple over rice. It’s all gone!
★★★★★
I didn’t think about adding pineapple but it sounds delicious im going to try that its my first time to make it
Pineapple! So doing this next time
I made this dish tonight. Marinated the shrimp for about 2 hours, slightly reduced the amount of honey and added the ginger and cornstarch. Had leftover brown rice and leftover roasted broccoli so this was right on time. Oh, how did it taste??? No idea! Served family to include Hubby, 8 year old and annoyingly picky 6 year old. Everyone showed up with empty plates for seconds before I could make my own plate. So maybe next time (smile). Oh, and I had to promise to make it again every week. Thanks for the recipe.
This was delicious! It somehow came out wayyyyy too salty… maybe try a different soy sauce, or just less of it next time.
★★★★
You are a great mom! I hope you get some next time. I appreciate your review. I am making this tonight.
this was absolutely delicious! I didn’t see about thickening with cornstarch until now. Next time I’ll do that. I did substitute 1/4 cup dry quinoa for 1/4 cup of the brown rice, but thats just me and doesn’t affect the taste at all. I’m putting a single serving in the freezer to see how that works, but, boy oh boy was this ever good
Why would you want to sit on the shrimp? I am making this again tomorrow which will be my second time. The first time I made it I used less honey than the recipe called for because I don’t care for my entrée to be sweet. It was delicious.
Definitely a hit! Might make sure my ginger is a bit fresher next time for a little more heat;-)
This was amazing with a broccoli side will 100 % make it again ! Thank you ❤️
I am a college student and this is my go-to after-class dinner! It’s so easy. I can quickly make my marinade before class, and come home and pop my shrimp on the stovetop, put asparagus or broccoli in the oven and I’ll be eating dinner in 10 minutes! It’s perfect for anyone to try, no matter how skilled you are (or are not, like me) in the kitchen!
★★★★★
What other quick meals do you make? I’m a mom of three and need more quick meals like this!
The sauce itself is so versatile! Shrimp, Chicken, pork, salmon, or tofu! Absolutely delicious! Definitely a keeper. Definitely add the ginger, it adds a nice zing!
★★★★★
Anybody know nutrition facts for this recipe? Need to know how many calories are in this! Thanks in advance!
Hi Frank, We don’t usually include nutrition information as it can vary between different brands of the same ingredients. Plus, many recipes have ingredient substitutions or optional ingredients listed. However, there are many handy online calculators where you can plug in and customize your exact ingredients/brands. Readers have found this one especially helpful: https://www.verywellfit.com/recipe-nutrition-analyzer-4157076
Easiest recipe and so good. I make it everytime I visit my father and he is eating them before they’re cool.
★★★★★
I loved this recipe. So easy to make for a non chef!! I will be making in again but use a regular fry pan rather than a wok
★★★★★