Ribs and the Big Green Egg

Our dinner group met a couple of weeks ago and combined with another group for a grillfest of sorts. It was held at Casey and Mark LaCore's son Brian's house and he happens to own a Big Green Egg grill. Now I have never used one of these things so I was looking for direction from Brian and help to finish off my St. Louis Spare Ribs once I got there.


To back up just a bit, I had wanted to make ribs for a long time and I had a fairly good idea as to the method I wanted to use, which was slow cooking them in an oven and then finishing them on the grill. A good friend and customer of mine does them this way so I called my friend Vern Blyckert for his take on the process. He told me that he uses pork spare ribs and cuts them into one or two rib pieces and then seasons them with a rub and some sauce overnight and then wraps them in foil and cooks them at 300 degrees in the oven for 1 1/2 hours and then finishes them on the grill. OK, sounded like a good method and I know that low and slow is the deal so I thought I would "tweak" this a bit. I found a rub from Steven Raichlin that sounded good and added my smoked salt to it rather than regular salt and used a vinegar based "mop" for the oven phase and grilling phase as well as adding applewood smoking chips to the grilling phase to enhance the flavor more.

Now I am not a fan of barbeque sauce so I skipped that and liberally rubbed those rib racks and left them whole after removing the silver skin from the back side, then let them rest, wrapped in foil and sprinkled with some of the mop for an overnight stay in the refrigerator. I then set the oven for 300 and placed those foil packets of ribs in the oven and cooked them for about 2 hours. Next, I let them rest a while, wrapped in a big packing blanket and headed off to Brian's house to finish them off. In the meantime I soaked about 2 cups of applewood chips in water for about an hour and drained them and put them in a plastic container for the trip.

Once at Brian's he gave me a crash course on the Green Egg; it is an amazing piece of equipment. It is a ceramic and porcelain cooker, almost like a wood fired oven which can be closed down to cook at 200 degrees and then opened up by the use of vents and draft controls to cook at temperatures near 700 degrees. Brian had been been cooking all day at 200 to 250 degrees and when I got there he opened the vents and draft and it rose to 450 in a matter of several minutes. I placed the wet smoking chips on the coals and then put the ribs on the grate and mopped them and close the lid. The smoke began to pour out of the vent at the top and about 4 minutes later I opened the lid, flipped the ribs and mopped them on the other side. About three more minutes and we had some good grill marks and a goodly amount of smoke flavor as well. The ribs were cooked perfectly and were almost falling off the bone; it was a success.

Here is the recipe for the rub and mop: This is enough for two racks of St. Louis Spare Ribs

4 1/2 teaspoons freshly ground Black Pepper

4 1/2 teaspoons Dark Brown Sugar

1 Tablespoon Smoked Salt (mine, smoked over apple wood for 12 hours)

1 1/2 teaspoons Celery Salt

1 1/2 teaspoons Cayenne Pepper

1 1/2 teaspoons Garlic Powder

1 1/2 teaspoons Dry Mustard

1 1/2 teaspoons Ground Cumin

Mix all spices in a small bowl and use about two thirds of the mix to rub down the ribs before placing them in the refrigerator.

Mop:

2 cups Cider Vinegar

1/2 cup Yellow Mustard

2 teaspoons Smoked Salt

Mix these ingredients in a medium bowl and sprinkle or brush some on the ribs before baking and then more as you grill them on each side

Cook well, eat well and enjoy much!

Tim