STUPID Ribs...

[MallardWacker]

For a while now the hen Mallard has been clamoring for some Loin Backs so I stopped off this past Saturday evening at Sam's and bought one 3-rack cryovac package.  Just Like I normally do.  I was in no mood to go through the normal ritual that I seem to find myself doing in the pursuit of the perfect rib...I just wanted to get them done with out a bunch of hull-a-balew.

SO this Saturday night all I did was pull the skin and cut the racks in half...no rub just wrapped them and put them back in the fridge.

Sunday Morning I pulled them out about an hour or so ahead of time, probably longer I crawled back in bed.  Any way eventually got back up, plugged in the smoker and proceeded to put my favorite rub  on and through them in the smoker...no big deal.  Now this is the frustrating part, I looked at them 4hrs later and they were done, tossed them on the grill for a couple of minutes to glaze on some sauce and those stupid thing were near perfect!  Very tender, like I like them-not so tender they just come falling off every time you touch them but just a little cling around then knuckle and quite frankly some of the best tasting I have made to date if I say so myself.

Time after time I sit and struggle with watching temps, preheating, putting on the rub at the right time and doing some form of rib dance then give it spritz or two of something so that it comes out with some sort of success.  But Noooo I just through them in the good old Bradleyand out comes near perfection...DANG RIBS ANYWAY.

[iceman]

Kinda makes a fella wonder why we go through all the ritual stuff MW. I think theres a law somewhere that says you have to make it as complicated as possible or the rib bird of life will drop poop on your head.
Like Ann says "it is entertaining to say the least". If we started doing things the easy way we'd have to come up with a different reason to kick back and suck down the cold ones. Whenever she's looking I have to look like I'm adjusting something on the smoker so I don't get roped into the evil clutches of "THE HONEY DO LIST"! :D :D :D ::)

[BigSmoker]

I recently stopped all the prep with my ribs.  I just pull off the membrane,  sprinkle with rub, plug in the smoker, put the ribs in 40-45 minutes later.  Simple just seems to be best most of the time when it comes to Q.  I'm glad they turned out good 8) ;D :P :P.

[asa]

Good job, MW, and nice story. My guess is that you benefited from the BS being only 1/2 full since 3 racks of baby backs cut in half will fit easily on two racks. Being a lot thinner than say a whole 7# shoulder, they will get up to cooking temp pretty fast. After smoking and cooking a variety of combos of shoulders and ribs in the BS (admittedly only over the past 2 months), I've concluded that in the future if I want to do ribs for a group, I can start in the morning, smoke for 3-4 hours, then just let them sit at ~150-160 for a couple of hours until serving. The more I try to cook, the longer it will take. For example, using double racks, one could smoke 12 racks at a time. You'll get the smoking done in the same time as you did with your 3 racks of ribs, but cooking will take proportionately longer. In summary, I think that with the slow cooking method we have a lot of leeway. The tricks are 1) not to overcook/overheat them and 2) let them cook at ~160-165 for at least a couple of hours to tenderize etc (to as long as 4-5 hours or perhaps holding even longer at 150 in the oven as I've done with good results).  Dadgummit, I need 6 months off and some private foundation funding to try all of these combinations!