4th of July (Coming Right Up) Hot Ribs -- A Little Bit Different

As part of my ongoing articles on foods/recipes that go well with HEAT, I'm going to include something for 4th of July weekend. Pork Spareribs on the grill. Perfect. Except ... maybe not the same old ribs on the grill, maybe something a little different, and ... a little better even. But not hard to make. That's the ticket. That's what I've been planning for the 4th anyway.

We are not going to brine the ribs. That's too much work. We are going to get major flavor from them, though, in 2 ways.

One, we are going to semi-cure them -- the outside anyway -- and dry out the exterior, so it crisps up nicely.

Two, we are going to a make a hot pepper and sweet bell pepper mop/infused sauce, or whatever you want to call it, for a BBQ sauce, to slather on for the last 1/2 hour or so, and some extra, for serving the ribs with. I think it's very, very good.

OK, pick the pork ribs of your choice; they can be baby backs, or spareribs. The only difference will be the cooking time. The sauce that follows is based on 1 rack of ribs -- if you have more increase the sauce accordingly.

With either cut, we will rinse and dry the ribs and then lay them in a large sheet pan, and salt, pepper (use freshly ground black pepper), and sugar (use light brown sugar) the top and bottom of the ribs and the trimmings. And if you want to get some heat on the ribs at this point, you can dust the racks and trimmings with ancho or chipotle chile powder as well. If you are using spareribs, do trim and save the non-bony parts from the rib sections with a knife of kitchen shears, and trim as well any large flaps of meat that are attached to the bottom of the ribs. No need to tear the membrane from the bottom of the rack. Since the trimmings are done sooner than the other parts, you can be eating your appetizer while waiting for the rest of the BBQ to finish!

Then put the uncovered pan in the fridge overnight or until a couple of hours before you are ready to grill. At which time, pull them out and let them come to room temperature before grilling them. The dry-rub salt and sugar mixture will have dissolved to a glaze coating the ribs, which is perfect.

I often cheat and start with a commercial sauce; I like a bottle of Stonewall Kitchens Mesquite Steak Sauce, not for steak, but for PORK, and a small jar of Hoisin Sauce, say 8 oz, to start the mop or BBQ sauce, and then:

I then add a non-traditional Bell Pepper reduction. This is actually the basic recipe for one of my Fresh Hot Pepper Sauces. You can do without it if you like or just use your favorite BBQ sauce, but I am willing to go the extra mile! For the Flavor! And the Bell Pepper reduction does combine vinegar (acid), salt, and sweet flavors, which are traditional, so ...

Oh, you need a juicer!

8 to 12 red, yellow, or orange sweet bell peppers, depending on size

16 cloves of garlic

1 large sweet or Vidalia onion

1 TBS salt, preferably sea salt, or to taste

Rice Wine Vinegar, approx 1/2 cup

Hot Peppers of choice -- I like 4 or 5 Habaneros, myself, but you can substitute the Hot Sauce of your choice instead, if you wish.

Juice the first 3 ingredients (and Hot Peppers if using), and add the salt, and vinegar, but add about 10% by volume only, approx 1/2 cup depending on the juice in your peppers and onion.

Now reduce (in a non-stick frying pan) the pepper juice mixture by about 75%, that is, leaving only 25% of the original volume of liquid.

The remaining pepper liquid should have become a little thick and syrupy.

Check the seasoning. You should have a bright, sweet, somewhat garlicky and oniony, but not salty liquid -- if the flavor does not pop enough add salt a TSP at a time until the flavor develops.

Good. Mix it all together, that is, the Mesquite Steak Sauce, the Hoisin, and the Bell Pepper reduction you've just made. Taste it. If you want something hotter, juice more Habaneros, or add your Hot Sauce of choice, or some Huy Fong Chili Garlic sauce, for a really good kick. You don't want to add the Bell Pepper reduction, or make it? Fine. The Mesquite/Hoisin mixture is great by itself. Just add your Hot Sauce. You should end up with about a quart of BBQ sauce total if you have added the Bell Pepper reduction.

Now we are going to grill the ribs at 300 DEG until they are tender and nearly done. For those of you with a digital meat thermometer, that's about 180 degrees. For those of you who do not, that's when 1/8" of bone starts to show at the sides of the racks of ribs and the ribs are knife tender, but not fork tender.

If you are doing this on the grill, be sure to use indirect heat, and do not place the ribs directly over the open flame. Place them bone side down.

At the 180 DEG point with 1/8" of bone showing, we begin to mop the ribs (top and bottom) with the mop/glaze every 15 minutes or so, for about 1/2 hour(3 mops) to 45 minutes (4 mops), at which point the ribs will measure around 190 to 195 DEG , and they will show 1/4" of bone and start to pull apart easily. The whole thing will take a little over an hour for the trimmed pieces; the back ribs may take and hour and a half; the spareribs make take 2 hours to 2-1/2 hours.

OK, they are done.

Serve.

Happy 4th of July!

You don't actually need the excuse ...

~Ted

Beef Short Ribs -- Foods for Hot Sauce

So we like Hot Sauce because it makes food taste good, right? Yes! In keeping with that. I'm going to post one of my favorite recipes, which is great with almost any Hot Sauce, and is particularly tolerant of REAL Heat. That is ... my Braised Short Ribs. My God, I love it. I consider this to be The Ultimate Beef Stew.

The recipe will make 16 single rib servings, which in my house translates to 8 or fewer servings. And it makes a lot of honest beef stock gravy, in this case, really, sauce, that is thickened with the natural gelatin from the collagen in the cartilage and bones of the short ribs.

Do not be tempted to marinate the short ribs before cooking -- it is not necessary -- the short ribs have tremendous flavor and texture all by themselves.

This recipe is good with lots of sides, mashed potatoes, noodles, and good with Cayenne Pepper Sauce. It's good with Habanero Pepper Sauce, too.

I cook it in the Slow Cooker after browning the ribs, and I like to let the ribs braise overnight, or about 12 hours on low, strain and de-fat the liquid in the AM, and recombine the sauce and the Short Ribs by dinner time. You do not have to use a slow cooker for this, however, and braised in the oven at 300 for 6 hours or so or on the stove for 6 to 8 hours at low, the dish will be fine. For oven or stovetop, test each hour after 3 hours or so for doneness -- when the meat starts to fall off the bone, it's done.

Braised Short Ribs with Red or White Wine:

8 lbs of beef short ribs, or flanken, preferably with the bone in
1 large sweet onion, rough chop
2 large sweet onions medium dice
3 large carrots, rough chop
3 cups medium dice carrots
4 stalks of celery, rough chop
3 cups medium dice celery
8 cloves of garlic, chopped
4 to 8 TBS tomato paste
4 bay leaves
Bouquet Garni (small bundle) of fresh herbs -- parsley, oregano, marjoram, rosemary, thyme ...
2 or 3 TSP freshly ground black pepper or pepper mix
3 TSP sea salt
3 to 6 TSP fresh (not old) paprika
1/2 to 1 bottle drinkable cabernet or merlot, not too dry, or (my choice) sauvignon blanc--full bottle

Optional -- pearl onions, mushrooms ...

The recipe will involve 3 cooking segments -- 1) preparing the ingredients for the slow-cooker, about 30 minutes -- 2) straining and de-fatting the stock, and removing the fat, bones, and rubbery parts from the short ribs, about 30 minutes-- 3) reducing the stock, sauteeing some new veggies and combining the ingredients, about 30 to 45 minutes. The 3 cooking segments are spread out over a 24 hour period, which for me are usually the afternoon of the day before serving, the morning of the day the dish is served, and the evening of the meal.

Part 1:

On a large sheet pan place the short ribs in a single layer, douse them with olive oil and salt generously, then brown them in a 450 degree oven for about 30 minutes or longer until well colored.

Transfer to the bottom of a large slow cooker, including juices from the pan.

Add all other ingredients, and then enough water to bring to a level with the top layer of veggies. Slide bundle of herbs (Bouquet Garni) into pot at the side. If you have an unsalted demi-glace or stock (beef or chicken) you could add that in place of the water -- it is not necessary.

At this point you could add some optional spices, like 2 or 3 TSP of ground chipotle pepper, or ancho pepper, 1/2 TSP of liquid smoke, or 2 TSP of cumin, or whatever you think will taste good. Or you could save the modifications for the next time you make this.

So now you set the slow cooker for low heat and 12 hours, the night before, and come back in the AM to an all-pervasive aroma that makes you hungry for dinner before you've even had breakfast. That's what happens to me, anyway.


Part 2:

After the slow cooker pot has had a chance to cool a bit, transfer , carefully and gently, all of the short ribs to an appropriate sized dutch oven, with enough room left over to add more sauteed veggies, and all of the stock.

After you've transferred the short ribs, you can slide the rib bones out of the meat and carefully pull or cut off the rubbery membrane that sleeves the bone.

Strain the cooking stock through a chinois or a fine mesh sieve and carefully compress the solid matter against the mesh to extract all that slow-cooked goodness.

Transfer liquid to tall 1 or 2 quart containers with lids and place in freezer until fat has congealed.

Part 3:

Then remove fat from top of the frozen stock containers with a spoon and discard.

Reduce stock by about 1/3 at a simmer.

Saute in 3 TBS neutral oil over medium high heat 3 cups each of medium dice carrots and medium diced celery until just softening about 5 to 8 minutes, and reserve.

Saute over medium high heat 4 cups of medium dice sweet onion in 3 TBS olive oil. until well browned but not burned, about 15 to 25 minutes. Nonstick pans are good for this. You are carmelizing the onion to get sweetness to balance the flavor of the braise, so this is an important step.

Add to stock and simmer for 30 minutes more. All of that oniony good sweet flavor will dissolve into the stew.

Taste and correct the seasoning with additional sea salt and freshly ground black pepper as required.

Pour stock and onion mixture back into dutch oven with short ribs and simmer for another 30 minutes.

Add any optional veggies, such as mushrooms or pearl onions (you can saute them a little first if you like to build flavor and pre-soften them)

Add carrots and celery to dutch oven and continue to simmer for 15 minutes.

Correct the seasoning again and serve. Add some Hot Sauce to the pot if all of your customers will approve.

You can serve this dish with flat egg noodles, or potatoes of almost any kind. You can see Scalloped Potatoes in the dishes above and below. To the recipe in the link above I also add a couple of cups of grated sweet onion sprinkled on every 3rd layer or so.

As I said earlier, to my own serving I add my SR Virgin Fresh Red Cayenne-Cherry Pepper Sauce that's made with fresh pepper juice, fresh garlic juice, and fresh onion juice as well as a little sea salt and rice wine vinegar. !!!


This dish gets better and better over the week to 10 days from making it, and you can serve it with different sides each time.

By the way, it freezes very well and keeps in the fridge for quite a while since it's immersed in the solidified gelatin of the sauce.

If you make it, let me know!

Yours in flavor and heat,

~Ted


Technorati Tags: Beef Short Ribs Beef Short Ribs Recipes Recipes Good with Hot Sauce