Saturday and Sunday, 22-Jan and 23-Jan-2022

Last weekend, I had a rather intense adventure out in the snow – and as a celebration afterward I got baby back ribs for dinner. Now, Oregon has some excellent BBQ, don’t get me wrong, but this… well, those ribs were not excellent BBQ. They were… I mean, probably mediocre?

I knew I wasn’t in for a treat when the chef brought them out 10min after I ordered them, and they kept that expectation in mind when I ate them. They weren’t bad, per say, but they were solidly mediocre grocery-store ribs.


Obviously, I deserved better.

So I cooked some myself!

• Bought a rack of ribs from the grocery store. Opened them up, and cleaned off any fat or other gristle.
• Absolutely slathered them in rub. Just… so much spicy mesquite rub. Honestly? Probably too much rub – next time, I’ll tone it down to about 75% of what I used this time.
• Let them sit overnight and for a day, for a solid 36 hours.
• Cooked them in the oven, uncovered, at 225 Deg.F for 30min
• Covered them in tin foil, and cooked them at 225 Deg.F for another 4 hours, until they hit ~190 Deg.F internal temp.
• Took the cover off, slathered some BBQ sauce on (a 50/50 split of Sweet Baby Ray’s and pan dripping from the ribs). Put them back in the oven for 30min. Next time, I’ll cook them to 170 instead – the internal kept heating up to a full 203, which was too high I think.
• Warmed up some buns, served the ribs when they got down to 170, and enjoyed fall-off-the-bone ribs!