Who doesn’t love slow-cooked baby back ribs. Well, I guess all the vegetarians and vegans out there don’t. But I am sure they have given up on reading this column long ago. There is no denying it, we are meat eaters.
There might be a version of tofu-baby back ribs, but let’s face it they just wouldn’t be the same as the sweet-tangy- tender-fall-off-the-bone-real-meat-from-the-hog-ribs.
I made some of these last weekend for a Kentucky Derby get together.
I like to slow cook the ribs. I roughly followed Alton Brown’s— of food TV fame— recipe. He gave ingredients for a dry rub, but, in the interest of time I just bought the McCormick version. It was really good, despite some unpronounceable ingredients. Someday I will come up with my own dry rub mix but not today.
I do make my own BBQ sauce. It is a secret recipe. It’s only secret because I don’t have a recipe. I just do it to taste with measurements being very approximate.
Back to the ribs. Get fresh all natural (whatever that means) baby back ribs. Rub them all over with a dry rub. Let them sit covered in the fridge with the rub for at least one hour.
Make a liquid with 1 cup of white wine, 2 tablespoons of Worcestershire sauce, 1tablespoon of honey and 2 cloves chopped garlic. Pour it in the roasting pan then cover with foil and cook nice and slow at 225 for 2½ to three hours until the meat starts to separate from the bone. I finished them on the grill for a few minutes basting with reduced pan juices. And a final baste of my secret recipe BBQ sauce. I cut them up and served them with more of my BBQ sauce.
I served it with cheesy grits and slaw. And in honor of the coming of asparagus, a baby red potato and asparagus salad with a mustard vinaigrette.
The food was devoured.
The Mint Juleps were good, too. Maybe too good.
—LUCY
The thing I love most about ribs (baby backs, St. Louis style pork, beef, veal, whatever) is that they are all really pretty healthy since they consist mostly of bones.
And a little fat is good in our diets, no matter what those V pods claim.
Let them make bone broth with the leftover ribs!
I am now off to the store in search of some baby backs.
As I am wont to say in Lou Land:
OH BABY BACKS! OH BABY BACKS!
— Lou