Pork Sparerib 'FLAP' meat


 
So, I cut my ribs St. Louis style this weekend, and each cut to square them up yielded a piece of boneless flap meat. This meat is approx 4 inches wide by 6 inches long (give or take).

At the time I was just focusing on the ribs and that was enough for me.

Suggestions on how to cook or what to do with the flap meat left over? There are smaller flaps too, and I would love to cook those up, but i have four really good looking pieces of meat that I don't want to waste...but I am not sure how to cook them or what to do with them...

Low and slow back on the cooker? pan fry them? Oven at 350?

And internal temp?

It's rib meat, but there are no bones or cartilage. it is pure meat. Very little fat. little to no connective tissue. So I want to avoid shoe leather, but I am not sure that low and slow would benefit much to break down tissues.

I am really stymied on this one.

Suggestions?
 
I usually rub them up and throw them on the smoker with the rest of the ribs and cook them low-n-slow. Because they will cook a bit faster I use them as testing and snack pieces. If I have guests I use them as tasty samplers.
 
I also cook them with the ribs. I also cook the other trimmings. On another site, I asked what todo with the trimmings. I received a lot of suggestions, but so far we have always just knawed away and there is little left. What is left, we added to some beans we were cooking...tom
 
Smoke em up then chop them up and add to a pot of baked beans or simply serve as an appy as others have suggested.
 
Originally posted by Chris Mills:
I usually rub them up and throw them on the smoker with the rest of the ribs and cook them low-n-slow. Because they will cook a bit faster I use them as testing and snack pieces. If I have guests I use them as tasty samplers.
I do EXACTLY what Chris Mills is describing.
 
Originally posted by Toby Keil:
Smoke em up then chop them up and add to a pot of baked beans or simply serve as an appy as others have suggested.
Oh man that sounds really good.
 
They are about the best thing to use for Chile Verde. I have about 4 lbs diced and waiting in a foodsaver bag in the freezer.
 
I usually buy spares and trim them into st louis style. I debone the scraps and grind them in a hand crank meat grinder. I mix the ground pork with a breakfast sausage spice mix from penzey's and wrap it in plastic wrap in a log. freeze it and slice it in to pucks for breakfasts.

Around here I can get spares for 2/lb and bb for 4-6/lb. after trimming I get about the same yield of bbq-able meat, that I paid about the same price for, but the spares yielded a bonus log of sausage.
 
Originally posted by Toby Keil:
Smoke em up then chop them up and add to a pot of baked beans or simply serve as an appy as others have suggested.

I am assuming this is the skirt. What Toby says. Did this twice over the holiday in the bean/s cook.

With St. Louis I basically cycled the ribs through with the skirt meat and the tips on the lower rack. Cooked everything pretty much the same way. In my case cooked for about 1.5 hours then foiled it all for about another 1.5 hours (checking with skewer for tender). I pulled everything pretty much the same time.

Only difference was I left the tips and skirts in foil after pulling from the WSM (did not finish on the grill). I took the ribs out of foil and broke them down to finish on the grill with the glaze, some plain, and some with my sauce.

Yesterday I took the tip meat and pulled it all down for sandwiches. Froze about 3 lbs and kept a little over a lb for sandwiches. Had some of them yesterday and they were awesome with the pom glaze. Just reheated with a little bit of AJ to warm up the meat, heated up some glaze that I saved.

I also plan to mix say a lb of the rib meat from the tips in with about 2lb of pulled pork from a previous cook to add more "burnt end/bark" flavor.

The skirt meat is a little tougher since it is thinner and doesn't have as much fat as the ribs and tips.

Sorry if this doesn't sound all that clear?

This all might not be totally clear. I maintained a 250 deg upper grate temp throughout. During the foil I added 50/50 mix of ACV and Orange Juice. Via heavy application from a spray bottle as I wrapped.

Lots of compliments on the ribs. I really like the St. Louis cut for the reasons above. They will cook a bit faster AFA spares since the ribs are separated.
 

 

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