First week with new smoker!

[jet]

I received my new SSBS on Monday!  While I was waiting for it to arrive, I read many of the articles and recipes in the forum here.  Thanks to everyone for providing their advice and information.  Because of you, I felt very comfortable with my first two smokes.

I did a quick meatloaf Wednesday night.  The meatloaf came out pretty good.  I didn't have all the ingredients on hand, but I really wanted to try out the smoker that evening.  I served slices the first day and had a sandwich the next.

Here are before and after pictures of the meatloaf:



Today I did some ribs.  They came out great!  They had a very nice smoky flavor.  My wife and daughters really liked them except they thought they were a bit too hot.  Next time I'll have to make two different heat levels.

Here's what I did::

• Remove membrane from three racks of ribs
• Cut each rack in two
• Apply rub to ribs, wrap, and let sit for one hour in refrigerator, one hour out on counter
• Fill feeder with four hours worth of alternating hickory and apple pucks.
• Heat smoker to about 220 degrees.
• Unwrap ribs and place into smoker
• Advance pucks to start smoking
• Leave door closed for two hours.  Monitor oven temperature and adjust to target of 200 degrees.
• After two hours and three hours, brush apple juice onto the ribs and rotate three racks top to bottom and front to back
• After four hours, remove from smoker
• Brush each rack with apple juice and then with barbecue sauce
• Wrap all ribs together in foil (2 stacks of 3 half-racks) and place into 200 degree conventional oven for two hours
• Remove from oven, wrap in towels, place in cooler
• Let sit in cooler for 90 minutes
• Unwrap and serve

Here are the before and after pictures:

[coyote]

Welcome to the good life Jet. Everything looks quite tastey. Good to have you with us. :)

                                                                                       Coyote

[Arcs_n_Sparks]

Welcome Jet,

Yeah, those ribs do have that incendiary glow about them....  May want to come down a few degrees for the family...  :o

Of course, that is the whole point: twenty years of experimentation ahead of you.

Keep up the great posts and pics.

Arcs_n_Sparks

[hillbillysmoker]

Welcome Jet, Those look so good.  Thanks for sharing.

[icerat4]

The stuff looks good.Give it time .Afew more smokes and youll be a pro.And have lots more friends and nieghbors coming over lol.

[Wildcat]

Looks and sounds super to me!  You obviously learned well by reading here!  That BS is a nice unit isn't it? Welcome to the forum!  ;)

[LilSmoker]

JET, looking at that food i'd say you did yourself proud

............LilSmoker

[West Coast Kansan]

Much more fun ahead  ;D

[IKnowWood]

Welcome JET

Please clarify, Hot as in spice level or temps.

Looking at your rib and pre-smoke, it looks like a very heavy rub on there.  You might want to sprinkle it more than heavy layer.

I used to do that and made one version that was way to sweet with Brown sugar & Turbinado.  Next I did was more cayene and hot Pepper (to spicy).  My fav right now is Goose Bay Pig Rub out of a sprinkle bottle.  Light sprinkle the night before and again just before going in.  Left more pure rib flavor. 

Mighty nice.  Have fun and learn along with us.  Its a wonderful tasty adventure.

[jet]

Thanks for the replies.  I am very pleased with the BS so far.

IKnowWood - They thought the spice level was a little too high.  I thought it just had a hint of heat.  Maybe their taste buds are more delicate than mine...  I actually used only half the amount of cayenne pepper that the recipe called for.  Maybe you're right about putting too much rub on. 

Any guidelines for how much rub to put on?  I don't know how you'd describe it - maybe X tablespoons per rack or per half-rack?