Abstract: Aspects of the subject matter described herein relate to serializing and de-serializing objects. In aspects, a serialization engine uses a grammar to serialize data into a binary representation. The serialization engine may call upon a host serialization engine to serialize embedded object that are not directly supported by the environment hosting the serialization engine. The serialization engine may encode the grammar used to serialize the data into the serialized data for use in de-serializing the data. After the object is serialized, the serialized data may be de-serialized when desired by using the grammar. The grammar is such that it causes embedded objects and relationships to be preserved in the serialized representation of the object.