Rib Meat and Cooking Beans Together?


 
Troy S

Troy S

TVWBB Fan
I did a quick search and couldn't find much for my specific question.

I'm smoking spare ribs (and a bird + a pork butt) on one of my little bitty drum cookers today. An idea popped into my head the other day, thinking about this (I swear food is on my mind 24/7). I'm going to trim up the spare ribs, remove the skirt flap and breast plate, square them up, etc.

I was planning on cooking up a pot of lima beans tomorrow. My go-to for beans has always been adding pork fatback, and sometimes ham bones. However, I have neither at the moment, and thought about this experiment: has anyone here tried using what they have trimmed from spare ribs and adding it to the beans? Usually I'll just cook up what I trim in the pit and enjoy it straight up.

I'm going to give it a go just to see. But I wanted to discuss this topic here. Should I pre-smoke the skirt flap + breast plate and then add it to the beans, or just straight into the pot when I cook them tomorrow? I'm thinking of going ahead and pre-smoking them and then adding them to the pot of beans, but I'm unsure.
 
Troy, I've used rib trimmings for lots of things, including beans. I would probably pre-smoke the trimmings before adding them to the beans, as I like to add that subtle smoke flavor like you would with a smoked hock, some ham, etc. Cook them until their just tender, remove, cool, and dice or chunk. Then add in the last 60-30 minutes of your bean cook (so they don't get stringy.) Should be great!

Rich
 
I do that all the time. I trim my spares up, put rub on all the parts and toss them on the cooker with the ribs. Pull the trimmings off about the time you would wrap your ribs, if you wrap. Dice them up and into the pot they go. I especially like the smokey pieces in collard greens
 
Thanks, guys! The lima beans turned out great! I used some of the meat from the breast plate. The smoke flavor didn't overwhelm them in the least. I was going to wait until today to make the beans, but I had some extra unexpected guests and so I quick-soaked the beans and got 'em going.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

 

Back
Top