cooking @ home

Here we go. The meat of meats, the summertime special, the reason — so many thousands of years from cavemen, we still like to do it their way — old school, neolithic old school — we’re talking about BBQ spare ribs, baby.

Maybe you’re totally into BBQ and smokin’, or perhaps you’re totally new. Either way, I’ve decided the best way to get the main elements across isn’t to repeat them in every barbecue recipe, but to refer to a single primer on the subject BBQ: Bringing Smoke to the Fire.

So feel free to give a once-over before continuing. Or, if you’re a veteran or you feel confident, let’s jsut get at it. One quick thing first, you need a grill, charcoal and wood chips. (If you do propane, fine, recipe doesn’t change at all.)

This is going to take about 2.5 hours of cooking time. That’s an important phrase. Like football playing time, 2.5 hours cooking time may actually mean 3-3.5 hours. This is an investment in time. And if you know me and my way of thinking, I don’t like putting a lot of time into my cooking unless the reward is worth the effort. And when it comes to BBQ spare ribs, yeah, it’s definitely worth it.

BBQ Pork Spare Ribs
©2007 Harry Kenney

ingredients:

One, three-pound slab, pork spare ribs

dry rub:

1 tbsp Paprika
1 tbsp Cumen
1 tsp Ginger Powder
2 tbsp Garlic Powder
1 tbsp Chilli Powder
1/2 tsp Cayenne
1 tsp Dry Mustard
1 tbsp Onion Powder
1 tsp Cinnamon
2 tsp Salt
1 tbsp Pepper

bbq sauce:

1 cup Ketchup (base)
1/3 cup Worchishire
2/3 cup Soy Sauce
1/2 cup Honey
2 tbsp Garlic Powder
1 tsp Ginger Powder
3 tbsp Dijon
1 tbsp Pepper
2 tbsp Lemon Zest
2 tsp Hot Sauce
2 tsp Horseradish sauce
Juice of 1/2 large lemon (or all of small lemon)

smoke:

chardonnay wood chips, personal preferrerence (mesquite or apple wood are very nice choices)

Put together dry mixture for rub. Rub all over the defrosted ribs. About 2/3 or 3/4 on the top, and the remainer on the underside. Place on cookie sheet, cover with plastic wrap and aluminum foil and place back in refrigerator for 1-6 hours. (No, not that long, you’re saying.) Bare minimum time 30-60 minutes, but really, the longer in the fridge with the rub, the tastier the meat and the more the tough meat will breakdown. Rush this and you will pay for it later; your call.

Get your grill going with your charcoal and wood chips. Shut the lid. Internal temperature of your grill should be at least 180°F and rising, also smoke should be seen coming out the sides. At that point, place the rack of ribs on the grill, facing upwards, on the side of the grill without coals nor wood. Remember this is indirect-heating and smoking. Shut the lid and check the grill’s temperature (from the outside) every half an hour. You should keep the heat between 220°F and 240°F; this is the ideal zone.

After the first hour, you will need to change wood chips for certain, and probably refresh the coals as well.

If you haven’t changed the coals in the first hour (you probably have), you’ll definitely need to add to them by hour-and-a-half. Again, let your temperature gauge tell you. Remember too, when the temperature has gone down to much, and/or the smoke has thinned to much, the cooking time has halted. You can’t start counting again until heat and/or smoke are back up to proper levels.

Before the two hour mark, make the BBQ sauce up as given above.

At the two hour mark, see how things look. Good chance the ribs are looking good. Pick them up with the tongs by the middle, over the grill. Just lift them up in the air. See how much bend you get. They should be benind like a U-shape at least as the cartiledge is cooking between each rib. Place back down, still facing upward. Add coals as needed. You probably do not need to add more chips. But it’s up to you to gauge this.

Take an internal meat thermometer and see if the ribs are getting towards where they should be. 150°F is the minimum safe temperature to safely eat pork and have any contaminants killed off. In terms of doneness, for pork: 160°F is considered medium, 170°F as well done. If you feel there’s about a half-hour or so left, start brushing on the BBQ sauce and do so every 10 minutes. Remember, the longer the lid is up, the longer amount of time for heat to escape. so do it right, but do it quickly and shut that lid back down.

Two things, you don’t want to burn sauce; put it on too soon and you will. (That is if you think there’s 30 minutes left and it’s close to an hour, you could burn the sauce). Second, when it’s all done you want the meat to almost fall off the ribs by themselfves with little prodding.

When you pick up the rack with tongs in the middle and it bends so much the two ends want to touch each other, you’re definitely at doneness. So, sight it, keep an eye on the barrel or drum (the grill’s inside) tempeature to make sure it stays in that zone, see how much the rack bends, and when you get 160°F-170°F, bingo.

Take inside, slice into individual ribs. Serve with sides and call yourself King (or Queen) for the BBQ.

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