Finished Spares


 
R

Rick Soliman

TVWBB Pro
So this was my 4th cook with Spare Ribs and I am still not convinced I have the time right. I let these go 7.5 hrs and the seemed very dry I kept trying the tooth pick test but they never really felt like butter they just looked really burnt. Is it possible to over cook with out having them fall of the bone? Could some one describe what the rib is supposed to look and fell like when you bite it. I am thinking my spares are huge but the meat is very thin. What do over cooked Ribs look/Taste like. Mine were a very tough bark and all most ham like texture.
 
Rick I share your frustrations. Everything I cook on the wsm is better than any I had cooked before but my wife says my ribs aren't there yet. I plan to do some ribs today but could not find any fresh ribs-NOT enhanced.
 
Rick,

My spares usually go between 7-9 hours (usually 8-9) Do you rub your ribs the night before, and if so does your rub have a lot of salt in it? If so, that could be where your "hammy" taste is coming from. As far as feel, I normally look at the ribs, look for the meat to cook down off of the rib and give it a wiggle test. I do not know about a tooth pick, but if I give my ribs a wiggle and the bone starts to give, I know they are done.

I am more unsure about my butts than my ribs, but I have been cooking ribs a lot longer than butts (even if it was on a POS Brinkmann). Thanks for your advice today Steve.

Brian
 
Rick,

I am sorry your spares didn't turn out the way you had hoped. I can tell you put an awful lot of effort into them. It has always been very difficult for me to get the larger ribs to turn out (although I am certainly no Jim Minion). I discovered however, that changing my rib selection made a world of difference. If you have a Sam's Wholesale close, they sell a 3 pack of St. Louis style that is hard to beat from a taste, consistency, and ease of cooking standpoint.

I think one of the problems with the larger racks of spares is that the volume of meat is different in different parts of the rib. There is a lot of space area, so it is tough to find consistency in thickness, toughness, etc.

I admire your perserverance, and good luck in your future cooks!!
 
Rick:
Try the 3-2-1 method. I've used this method my last 2 times and they were the absolute best ribs I've ever eaten. My biggest problem has been trying to remove the ribs from the smoker without the bones falling off the meat. This is especially difficult while cutting the individual ribs. Often times I wind up holding the bone with the meat lying on the platter.

During my next smoke, I'm going to shorten my time to maybe a 3-1.5-1.

Good luck with your ribs.
 
Rick--

If they "they never really felt like butter they just looked really burnt", then something's not right; I'm not sure I would say it's timing. It is hard for me to put 'time' (as in X minutes or Y hours) in the same context as 'barbecue' even though I know we all do it as it can make writing about what we do easier; it's just that it seems to put the primary emphasis on the wrong variable. I'm not sure I'm making sense here.

Yes, it is quite possible to overcook ribs without having them fall off the bone, especially since you didn't use foil. For me. ribs should have a firm, almost crisp, surface-feel (from a combo of the bark and the somewhat drier meat at the surface); the meat underneath (all the rest) should be tender, soft--but not mushy, and should release from the bone with a bit of a tug (I'm not a devotee of fall-off-the-bone).

The meat thickness (before cooking) should be proportional to bone size (for best results, imo) so your feeling that your spares were huge but had thin meat might be the primary problem especially if the fat-lean ratio was off with the meat (thin as it was) not having enough fat interspersed. No matter what size the racks, no matter what the fat-lean ratio, the ribs (or brisket, butt, picnic, chuck--this applies to virtually any meat) will be done 'correctly' at some point. The 'done' window is much narrower when fat levels are relatively low--think of the difference between the wide window one has with a fatty butt vs the narrower window one has with brisket.

Overcooked ribs are dry and tough; undercooked are usually tough but not really dry--they're more like chewy and not moist enough--there's a sense that you're trying to chew through connective tissue that has not broken down; with overcooked the sense is more like you're chewing dry meat fibers. (Does this make sense?)

"Hammy", to me, suggests meat that was rubbed too far in advance of cooktime, meat that was 'enhanced', or both. It also suggests the possibility of a high salt ratio in general.

"Burnt" suggests too high a cooking temp for the meat and/or the rub, or too long at whatever temp (though that's less common at lower temps).

What temp was your cooker at grate or lid? Do you happen to have a pic of the ribs before cooking? If not, how did the fat look--do you recall?
 
Kevin, great comments. What are your target temps for cooking spares and baby backs?

I certainly have experienced the overcooked ribs that are dry and tough. They never seemed to reach the done stage you describe. Perhaps I just missed it.

Earlier I alluded to successful cooks on a gas grill with wood chips cooked indirect. I used Raichlens recipe with a marinade of apple juice and lemon juice. Those ribs seemed to have a good moisture content...
 
I do Spares at 230 deg. I would think at 9 hours, they were overcooked. My wife picked up some huge spares that were 11 pounds total for the two racks. I wasn't really impressed with them after the cook. I'll stick with the 4 pounders. Even at that size, they were done in 7 hours, and were in foil for 1 hour during the cook.
 
Hammy taste - the ribs were either 'enhanced' or the rub had too much salt and/or it was left on too long. I rub my ribs and then set up the smoker. The ribs sit on the counter until the smoker is ready to cook. We're only talking about an hours time.

Dried out - the fact that they were large ribs with a thin layer of meat and cooked for 9 hours sounds like they were overcooked. Time is a good tool to use for checking the ribs. I'll start checking spares between 4.5 to 5 hours into the cook. Over time you develop a sense of how much longer the cook should go before they're done. Keep in mind that spares have a fairly small window of time between being undercooked and being overcooked.

You may also want to try spares from another source. I buy all of my spares almost exclusively from BJ's Warehouse and have been very happy with the results. I did try purchasing some from my local ShopRite when they had a pretty aggreessive sale and was not happy with the results. I tried their ribs on a few other ocaasions and the results were just as bad. Needless to say we don't buy our spares there anymore!
 
Kevin

This all makes perfect sense. It did feel like dry meat i was chewing on the only thing that saved it was the sauce. I had my brother taste them he didnt taste a hammy taste he just said something dosent seem right.

I will have pictures posted of the whole cook before the end of the day today.

Thank you all so much

Rick
 
Hey everyone let me know what you think. Also the brisket didnt have much of a smoke ring is that because I had a thick coating of rub?
 
Steve--

I do spares at 225-235 grate. If I were to do b-backs I would do the same. (I am not a fan of b-backs.) I don't check internals of ribs.

Rick--

First, your brisket looks wonderful--really great.

There's a shot of a cooked spare being held--pic #5--if that is representative then it doesn't look to me like the ribs were thin of meat. On the first pic (the raw racks), if you look to the right of the center of the rack on the bottom you'll see striated fat (kind of little stripes of fat interspersed with lean); that's what I look for across most if not all of the racks I buy. Regardless, though it'd be easier in person. except for a couple small areas which might be on the lean side the racks do not look excessively lean.

Do you recall how long into the cook the ribs were when the fourth pic was shot? Depending on how true the color is rendered in the pic, that's about the point I foil.

What was your grate temp? I'm left with thinking they just went too long. If you were running a high grate temp the cook should've been shorter than 7.5; the 'done' window is narrower at a high grate temp as well, but you should've hit it somewhere after 6 hours and noticed it when checking. If you were cooking at a lower temp then you should've hit done somewhere between 6.75 and 7.5 hours from what I can tell from the thickness in the pics. Hope thios helps.
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Rick Soli:
Hey everyone let me know what you think. Also the brisket didnt have much of a smoke ring is that because I had a thick coating of rub? </div></BLOCKQUOTE>Possibly. Usually though it's more a matter of the temp of the brisket going into the cooker and how hot the cooker is when the brisket was added. A heavy rub can impede a smokering though, especially if the rub is ground very fine and packed on thickly.
 
Kevin-
I cant take all the credit for the brisket my brother did that one on the WSM next to me.
As for the spares I glad you dont think they are "Crappy" spares because I get them for $1.20/lb and just bought 120LBS of them so I have a lot in the freezer. After reviewing my cook log I think that picture when they are still on the cooker was about 4.5-5hrs of cook time. The thick piece I am holding is from the center of the rack that was probably the best rib I got out of the cook. I went 8-8.5 hrs according to my log because I just kept testing with a tooth pick and they never felt buttery. I think I started the test too late and had already over cooked. My grate temp for most of the the cook was 245-265. Hotter than I usuall do my ribs.
 
What the hell--take the credit!
icon_smile.gif


<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content"> 4.5-5hrs of cook time </div></BLOCKQUOTE>I though so. I go by color but it comes at right about that time. That's my foiling point (with a pineapple-tamarind mix usually). I almost always foil these days because I like the added flexibility it offers as well as the subtle flavor notes of the juice. (Try foiling at some point and see what you think.)

My advice would be to reprise the cook but lower the grate temp. Not that you can't cook ribs at a higher temp--you can--but you'll have a bit more leeway at 230-235 grate. You just need to pretty much nail it one time then repeat without changing any variables. When you've nailed it twice you can up the grate temp to whatever you want to try, checking for doneness sooner, of course. Your doneness window will be a bit narrower but you shouldn't have trouble figuring the shorter cook time. Or you can just stick with--or revert to--a lower cook temp--your choice.
 
The pics show you trimmed them down to St. Loius cut. 7.5 hours very likely over cooked them. With this cut, plan on 5-6 hours at 225 - without foil. With foil, they can be done in 4. At 7.5 at 250, they were probably done in 4.5-5.

Have you tried a mustard slather yet? It'll keep ribs moister, giving you larger doneness window.

Some folks around here also remove the salt from their rubs and put it on seperately to control the amount on the meat.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

 

Back
Top