Tony's Food 201: Epic Ribs

I love everything about ribs.

I love the tenderness of the slow cooked, marbled meat. I love the smoky-grilly flavor. I love the satisfaction felt by tearing meat from the bone with the incisors and canines we evolved for that express purpose.

So of course, I had to tackle making them myself. This particular series of experiments started in medical school, and I've repeated it four or five times since, under varying conditions and sometimes with varying out comes. I made them once at my girlfriend's father's 60th birthday cook out, on his smoker. Little did I know, the birthday boy over did it on the charcoal and the grill heated to 600 degrees, during the "slow cooking" phase of the recipe. Apparently it was better than the last time he used the smoker, as one party-goer told me, when he got it up to temperature that actually made the paint on outside of it boil.

The biggest set back in creating this recipe was moving to place where state law doesn't allow gas or electric grills on balconies. I've since successfully modified the overall technique to take advantage of ovens. They come out almost as good as on the grill. I'm proud to say I figured out this whole recipe on my own, with out looking at any references for ideas. Also posted is my recipe for barbecue sauce, which co-developed with the rib recipe. Feel free to use regular old barbecue sauce from a bottle, though. Trader Joe's makes a good Kansas City style sauce.

Tony's Epic Ribs, On the Grill

• Enough hickory or mesquite wood chunks to cover the bottom of either a charcoal or gas grill. Soak them in water for an hour or two before putting them on the grill. The chips will burn up too quickly, the chunks will last long enough to smoke your ribs.
• 3-4 bone-in beef ribs per person you want to feed. I have yet to use pork ribs, but I guess you could substitute those if you can't find beef. This recipe probably won't work with boneless ribs, by the way, although feel free to try.
• 1/2 cup of barbecue sauce per serving of ribs, plus extra to serve the ribs with after they're done cooking. My personal, homemade sauce recipe to follow.

For gas grills, arrange the soaked wood chunks along the bottom of the grill, and turn all burners on to low heat. Since this technique requires a drastic temperature change to finish the ribs, it's a little bit trickier for charcoal grills. You want to set it up so that your coals are only on one side of the grill. This will give you a "hot zone" and a "cool zone," arrange your wood chunks over the embers one one side. Place the ribs on the one the grill (over the "cool zone" on charcoal grills) and allow them to slowly smoke for over 2 hours. The longer you let this process go, the more tender your ribs will be. After they're cooked through and tender, either turn up the heat on the gas grill or transfer them to the "hot zone" of your charcoal grill. Slather them with barbecue sauce and let it bake/glaze on, about 20-30 minutes. Serve them with extra sauce and let your inner carnivore loose.

Oven Variant

This variation involves the same principle as above: slow cooking the meat to tenderness, then adding sauce and turning the heat way up. You won't have the advantage of adding extra flavor from hickory or mesquite wood though, so make sure you choose a sauce with enough smoke to make up for it. Use the same ingredients as above (minus the wood, of course). Place the ribs into a 250 degree oven for two hours. At this point, you can even take the pan out, cover it, and finish them later in the day if you're crunching on time, or traveling for a cookout. Once they're tender and cooked through, add your sauce and turn up the heat to 475. Let the sauce glaze on for 20-30 minutes. Again, you could potentially slow cook these bad boys in the oven first, then bring them to some one's house for a cookout and impress your friends after finishing them off on the grill.

The Barbecue Sauce Formula

I don't know that my barbecue sauce mimics a certain "style." There are tomato elements in there, so I guess if anything it would be a Western or Southwestern style of sauce.

• 1/2 can of chipotles in adobo (use about 1/2 of the chilies in the can and 1/2 of the adobo sauce).
• One large raw yellow or white onion, chopped.
• 1/3 cup of molasses, preferably blackstrap.
• 3 tbs. olive oil
• 3 tbs. tomato ketchup
• 2 tbs. Worcestershire sauce
• 1 tsp. smoked paprika
• black pepper and salt to taste.

Blend these all together. I use my immersion blender, less cleanup. Feel free to adjust any of the individual ingredients for individual taste, or to balance the tastes in the sauce. You ultimately want a sauce that is sweetand smoky, and just a little bit tangy. The olive oil will give it a good, rich mouthfeel, but won't majorly contribute to the flavor.

Meat 101: Braised Short Rib

Thanksgiving break is over, back to the learnin'.

A couple of months ago, my girlfriend and I went on a short vacation to Burlington, VT. I had spent a month there on an audition rotation for a neurology program, and then we had gone in 2008 for a short weekend away. Needless to say, I'm pretty familiar with Burlington, but prior to this last vacation I had never been to Trattoria Delia, and had never eaten wild boar (Figure 8.a).

Figure 8.a - The noble and apparently delicious wild boar. (http://www.linburnes.org/)

They served it braised, pulled apart and tossed with heavy, hearty roman gnocchi. It was an amazing meal to be had on a freezing Vermont evening. The problem with knowing how to cook is that every time you sit down to a meal, you think "I could do that." Not willing to buy wild boar meat online and have it shipped across the nation (my mom always told me never to pay more than $1.99/lb for meat, a truth I've held to for the majority of my adult life) but wanting to re-create the dish I loved so much from my vacation, I set off to the grocery store. I was armed with a knowledge of cuts of beef, their relative flavors, and the application to use them in (Figure 8.b).

Figure 8.b - I like this chart because it reminds me of the periodic table. (http://fornaturalfood.com/)

Braising is a form of slowwwww cooking, so its ideal piece of meat is one that is as flavorful as possible, tenderness be damned. It's the same reason stores sell super-tough chuck all cut up for stew - by the time you're done simmering it, it will be as tender as... well... use your imagination. That day, I ended up with a package of boneless short rib that they were selling on the cheap. I already had the other essentials for braising at home (Figure 8.c) - a dutch oven, plenty of wine, black pepper and salt. So I set to it, and here we are to reap the fruits of my experimental labor.

Figure 8.c - Braising essentials, in no particular order.

Braised Short Rib

• One or two pounds of boneless beef short rib, or three to four pounds of beef short rib on the bone, depending on how many people you plan on feeding and how long each of you plans on eating left overs. The key here is to at least double up on the pounds if you're buying your meat on the bone. Any meat with bones is arguably more flavorful than without, but do what you want.
• One or two big glugs of olive oil.
• A large onion, cut into half-rings.
• Enough black pepper to slightly surpass your comfort level.
• Half a hand full of sea salt or kosher salt.
• A bottle of red wine that you like - I pictured Pinot Noir because that's the only one I had on hand tonight. For the initial recipe, I used an old vine zinfandel. Feel free to use Cabs, Chiantis, Super-tuscans, et cetera.
• (Optional) A couple of sprigs of fresh rosemary.
• Two big pats of butter -or- two more big glugs of olive oil.
• Half and hand full of all purpose flour.

Preheat your oven to Bake 275. That's right. Not the universal bakers' 350, 75 degrees less than that. Coat the meat with salt and pepper. Place the oil, the onions and your short rib in a dutch oven. I use plain cast iron, the enamel ones work fine too. You can use any pan with a cover that you can put on the stove top and the oven without it melting. Brown the meat on all sides well on medium high heat.

Pour yourself a glass of wine. After the meat is done turning brown and tasty, pour the rest of the bottle of wine into the pot. Add the rosemary, if you're using it. Scrape what ever's stuck to the bottom up with a wooden spoon. Cover the pot/pan/earthen vessel/whatever and place in the oven. Let it simmer (i.e. braise) for two or three hours. Honestly, the longer you let it sit, the more tender the meat will be.

Finally, take the pot out of the oven. Scoop the meat out (leave the onions in), put it on a plate and cover it with tin foil. Return the pot to the stove top, and turn the heat up to high. Let the braising liquid (wine + meat juices = braising liquid) bubble away until it's about half way reduced. In a seperate pan, let your flour heat in a dry pan until it starts to turn gold-brown. Add in your butter or olive oil and whisk aggressively (butter + flour + heat = a roux). Take a scoop of your reduced braising liquid and whisk it into your roux, then return the whole thing back to the original pot. Reduce your heat to medium and stir, it will become drastically thicker. Return your meat to your newly formed gravy and toss it around. You can either serve it just like that, or pull it apart and toss it with pasta Vermont-wild-boar-style.

Hope you enjoyed today's installment, be back next week with more winter season food.