Spare ribs and quantity


 
S

Sherm Watkins

New member
I'm trying to do some planning for a church dinner a couple of months out. Just how many full racks of spareribs can I realistically cook at once on a 22" WSM? How about an 18"?

I've been cooking on a WSM for 10 or 15 years and have both sizes but have always gone with pork butt when I needed quantity. The only time I've ever gotten into double digits rack counts I had 3 smokers available.

I'm figuring on 1/2 pound raw weight per person plus sides.
 
With a rib rack on each grate, you should be able to get 10 racks of ribs...7-8 standing up and 2-3 laying across them. You're not cooking for a contest, so it's not critical...

Pile it up, build a bigger fire and let the smoker work.
 
I'd just use six slab racks to get a dozen on the big wsm, with maybe a few more layed on top. Actually though, with the 18.5" wsm, having the ends of the slabs jammed together isn't a terrible thing since that helps them keep from overcooking (in the outer "hot zone") before the whole slab is tender. Of course, the down side is that you can have light spots that don't get bark where slabs touch each other.

Nine St. Louis spares in my 18.5" cooker works pretty good, 4.5 slabs in rib racks on each grate, the half slab in the middle slot. Sorry I don't post pics, but I just use the cheap 3 slot "rib and tator" racks from Lowes. I use the outer potato prongs to manage the outer slabs, and you can use skewers to help manage the ends of the slabs if you want to to minimize light spots where ribs are touching.

If folks in your neck of the woods are accustomed to having ribs glazed, try finding a glaze that works well when applied in the pan right after smoking, like Danny Gaulden's simple mustard/brown sugar glaze. Search and you should find it here somewhere if you want to try it.
 
Ribs reheat really well so you may want to consider cooking them ahead of time and reheating for service. Do a search on reheating ribs and I'm sure you'll fine ample info should you choose that route.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

 

Back
Top