# Smoked Ribs, but I cheated



## Chief Longwind Of The North (Mar 11, 2007)

Had to somehow create smoked ribs, while I spent the day 150 miles away from my home, and have it all done for two hours after I got off work. Various family members had plans and time-tables. So here's how I did it and they came out fantastic. In fact, the person for whom these ribs were made (a visiting niece who I hadn't seen for about ten years) stated that they were the best she had ever eaten! And you know how my head swelled then. 

Ingredients: 
5 lbs. very meaty pork spare ribs.
4 cups water
Salt
1/2 tsp. Mesquite flavored Liquid Smoke
2 cups brown sugar
3 tbs. tomato catsup
3 tbs. rice-wine vinegar
3 tbs. light corn syrup
2 tbs. chili powder
1 tbs. Worcesterchire Sauce (Lea & Perrins)
1 tsp. granulated garlic powder
1 tbs. granulated onion powder

Preheat the oven to 205 degrees F.
Place 3 lbs. of the ribs into a large roasting pan. Rub cooking oil all over the ribs, both sides. Sprinkle with salt. Add 2 cups water. Cover tightly with foil and place in the oven. Braise for 9 hours.

When I got home from work, an hour before I took the ribs out of the oven, I placed the remaining ribs into my pressure cooker, standing them up so that the rib bones maintained a vertical orientation. Sprinkled with salt, added 2 cups of water, and cooked at 15 lbs. for 45 minutes.

While the ribs were cooking, I made my barbecue sauce using the brown sugar, sorn syrup, onion, garlic, liquid smoke, catsup, vinegar, and worcestershire sauce. I had my family members taste test the sauce to make sure it was right.

Ten minutes before the ribs were to be removed from their resopective cooking vessels, I fired up the Webber Kettle with a divided bed of coals. I place apple-wood on the hot charcoal and put the ribs above, and between the charcoal beds. Covered and let the smoke do its work for about 5 minutes per side. I had to do this in two batches.

Frankly, I didn't know if this method was going to provide enough smoke flavoring, or if it would dry out the meat. So I was very surprised that everything came out so wonderfully flavored.

The meat was very moist, and was fall-off-the-bone tender. You'd think I knew what I was doing or something. The smoke saturation was perfect as well. The rice-wine vnegar added really enhanced the barbecue sauce, so that it wasn't too sweet. This was a huge success.

Moral of the story, if you're hurting for time, or can't constantly tend the grill, you can still have great smoked spare ribs by using either a slow braise in a slow oven (205 degrees was perfect), or by using a pressure cooker at 15 lbs. pressure. Combine that with the grill and some wood and you can mimick the results of a slow and carefull smoking.

Seeeeeya; Goodweed of the North

Sorry about the typo in the title.  I tried to change it, but don't know how after the post is initially made.


----------



## Snoop Puss (Mar 11, 2007)

Now that sounds like something I could manage if I can just get me some liquid smoke... Come on YT, we need you to come up with a method for making distillate of smoke (technical term I just invented there!).


----------



## YT2095 (Mar 11, 2007)

actually I wouldn`t call it cheating at all, I`de call it Good Thinking 

as for a smoke distillate (and yes it is a correct word you used), as far as I can tell Smoke is bubbled under water and the sovated parts get infused and the non solvated parts condense as a brown tar like liquid, obviously this has to be done under positive pressure to get the smoke gas and particulate matter through.

it`s not Impossible to do at home, but on a small scale it wouldn`t be worth the effort, you`de need to be looking at decalitres of water in order to make it worthwhile.

although the addition of Alcohol would be Very Good as then you`de have Polar AND Non Polar solvents in action, allowing you to scale it down somewhat 

trust me, I Have considered this proceedure myself in the Lab, and it IS doable, only a couple of ladies on here have be kind enough to send me some liquid smoke already, and so I`ve gotten Lazy, and enjoying every minute of it


----------



## CasperImproved (Mar 16, 2007)

Goodweed of the North said:
			
		

> Had to somehow create smoked ribs
> 
> Moral of the story, if you're hurting for time, or can't constantly tend the grill, you can still have great smoked spare ribs by using either a slow braise in a slow oven (205 degrees was perfect), or by using a pressure cooker at 15 lbs. pressure. Combine that with the grill and some wood and you can mimick the results of a slow and carefull smoking.
> 
> ...



Hello  Goodweed - I will assume that what you made was most excellant. I do not prescide to the tough standards that they have on USENET Alt.Food.BBQ, (so I won't report you). I actually have a smoker, just haven't actually used it yet since I wanted to make mods to it, and haven't had the time. Good on you for reporting a good out-come to good eats done quickly vs. slow and smoke.

Casper


----------



## LMJ (Apr 5, 2007)

YT2095 said:
			
		

> as for a smoke distillate (and yes it is a correct word you used), as far as I can tell Smoke is bubbled under water and the sovated parts get infused and the non solvated parts condense as a brown tar like liquid, obviously this has to be done under positive pressure to get the smoke gas and particulate matter through.


 
Quoting Alton Brown (as I often do, even in situations completely unrelated to food), from the episode "Urban Preservation II":

"    All you have to do is build yourself a still. Break out a grill, a smoker, or an outdoor fireplace, anything that has a chimney on it, and extend that chimney with a piece of heat ventilation pipe from the hardware store. That's going to allow the smoke to cool off so that it will be easier to gather. Now I just use a little collar of foil at the bottom so that it'll seat and I put another piece of foil up at the top. And I top that with a bundt pan, perfect for liquid smoke collection.
    Chuck in some burning charcoal and follow that with a couple of handfuls of well-soaked wood chips. Then, the actual distiller part. You're going to need to place a bowl that's a little narrower than the bundt pan on top. And you've got to prop it up for air flow with a couple of pieces of metal, I don't know, pencils, chopsticks, whatever. Then on top of that bowl  place a bag—a zip top—full of ice. That is going to chill the bowl and that'll force condensation which will then run down—as you can see here—into the bundt pan for easy gathering. Now this is basically the same way that whiskey and bourbon are made.
    Now about ten minutes later, you can come back, and you will notice that you've got probably about a tablespoon of liquid smoke accumulated in the bottom of the pan. Of course, the more wood you burn, the more liquid smoke you'll make. Yum."


----------

