For my second smoke, I smoked St. Louis ribs I bought unseasoned from CostCo. Traditionally, for years my approach has been to bake my ribs in the oven at 250 for 4-5hrs in a roasting pan or Dutch Oven and my results have always been consistent. Smoking ribs for the first was a bit un-nerving, however, the results were fantastic and as were the comments of my Easter company today.
I seasoned my ribs with garlic salt, onion powder, cayenne pepper, & black pepper after removing the membrane and wrapped them in press 'n seal and aluminum foil and refrigerated them for roughly 32 hours. For wood, I used 2 blocks of Black Cherry and 1 Hickory (total 2.6 oz). I used a half a can of water (using a small Sweetened Condensed Milk can) and set the gauge at 235 degrees. To monitor the internal temperature of my #1, I have a new ThermoPro Dual Probe wireless thermometer. I placed the thermometer probe on a clip at the back of the smoker, near the smoker sensor. All three racks were covered with the ribs, but not stacked on each other.
What became a little stressful for me, (ok a lot stressful knowing I was having Easter company coming over), was that my thermometer for the first 3 hours was holding at 186 degrees. I wondered if it was due to the amount of meat I had in the smoker or if it was my thermometer, since it was my first attempt at using the thermometer. I decided that since I was seeing a consistent amount of smoke coming out, I needed to just trust that the smoker was doing it's job, convincing myself that I was not going to open the smoker until at least 5 hours had passed. When I opened my smoker, I was more than pleased and relieved.
Results: The ribs on the bottom rack looked a little more done than the middle and the top racks. I moved the bottom ribs into an aluminum pan and lightly brushed some of my homemade BBQ sauce on them and put them back in the smoker for 15 minutes on the top rack. I also moved the ribs on the top rack to the bottom for that same 15 minutes. All the ribs came out juicy, not too smokey, and delicious, pulling right off the bone. One additional observation was that in the last 30-45 minutes, the temperature on my thermometer went from 190 to 210, which was also during the period when I opened the smoker and moved the ribs from the top to the bottom. My guess is due to the amount of meat I had in my #1, there may not have been enough circulation to allow the temp to increase. Lesson learned, if in fact that was my issue.
All in all, I was very pleased with my first experience smoking ribs and I look forward to many more....I think my company thinks so too.
