Inaugural smoke - bit... meh

[biggus_richus]

Hello all,

I did my first smoke yesterday, three racks of loin ribs from Mr Waitrose. To be honest I was a bit disappointed; over seasoned and a bit dry. When I registered, someone said to post pictures of my first smoke, so here we go.

I lit up a chimney of cocoshell briquettes and piled them into the WSM; put everything together, added a kettle of boiling water to the water pan and put the lid on. Tweaked the vents and got the temperature to around 225 - the needle on the thermometer was around the 12 o'clock mark.

The ribs went in at about 3:40; I prepped these on Saturday evening - washed, dried and given a coat of Bad Byron's Butt Rub.


Added a couple of handfuls of hickory chips - all I had handy - and then I just left it. Towards the end of the cook, the temperature dropped a couple of times, so I opened the door and aggravated the coals a little.

At 7:30, I added a coat of BBQ sauce. Got a bit sidetracked while I put the little man to bed and by 8:20 Junior was asleep the coals were dying, so out the ribs came:




Points for next time:

• Too much rub applied for too long - they were quite salty, and the rub might have drawn some moisture out making them too dry
• I was aiming for a four hour cook, but this was quite possibly too long, possibly also factoring into the dryness. One of my friends reckoned that four hours at 225 was waaaay too long; 170 - 185 should have been the temp for that amount of time
• I think the amount of coals was right - not sure if minion would have made any difference

Next Sunday is a new day and a new try. Lots of time to read up and change my approach. Anyone got any other pointers?

Thanks for reading,
Rich.

[oddsocks]

aww man...i get my wsm next monday, and i can appreciate how badly you wanted this to turn out perfect. but you clearly know your way around food because if you didn't, you wouldn't have found this site. personally, i'm looking at this as learning to cook again, and although there will be some hitches, they won't be mistakes we make twice.

bet the ribs were tasty though

[joker smoker]

Hi there. Byron's Butt Rub is IMHO tasty but salty and is sugar free. For ribs you will, again IMHO, need to use a rub high in sugar or add some muscovado and/or demerara to your Bad Byrons. Also if you leave the rub on for more than 2 hours the salt in it will draw out too much moisture. I cook ribs at 200 F but most folk I know cook them at 225-250. Its up to you to find out what works best for you and your cooker.Hope this helps.

[esselle]

Your temp was fine - I wouldn't go any lower personally, and 4 hours seems a short space of time unless there was hardly any meat on them. Mine normally take 5-6 hours at 230. Did you foil them at all?
Follow Joker's advice on the rub though. Bad byrons is perfect on Pork.....but on ribs you want something a bit sweeter.

[biggus_richus]

Thanks for your comments so far.

I didn't foil at all. I have Gary Wiviotts Low and Slow book, and in his baby back rib lesson, he advocates taking the rib racks out of the cooker at 20 minute intervals so you can decide on how you like your ribs done. That would have been a good idea if my coals weren't dying.

For a six hour cook, I take it the minion method would be required?

[jotch]

Adapted BRITU Rub:
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup table salt
1/8 cup brown sugar - dry it out or I use demerara
4 teaspoons chili powder
2 teaspoons ground cumin
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 teaspoon black pepper, freshly ground
1 teaspoon granulated garlic
1 teaspoon onion powder

I agree, sounds like your rub was wrong...cooking time and temp was fine and you should use the tear test to check when done. You can generally leave them for about 2-3 hours before checking on them and turning, then you can start basting them at midpoints with Apple Juice or similar which would reduce the drying out - foiling them is optional.

I apply the rub as I get them out of the fridge to warm to room temperature - so about an hour before cooking and then sprinkle on a little more before they go on the smoker.

Minion method could be used but you wouldn't need to fill it with fuel before adding the lit fuel...probably half full. Also, hickory is quite a strong smoke wood but it doesn't sound like they were too smokey?

[Zippy]

Definitely get on the minion method next time. Will make things a lot easier. Don't worry too much about wasting a lot of fuel. Once the food comes out just close up all of your vents and the fire will soon choke out.

I would apply your rub much closer to cooking time on your next effort. I think it was somewhere on here I read that if you leave a rub on for a long time (overnight), particularly if it's a high salt rub which is sounds like your is, the meat will start to cure and you'll get that really bacony flavour which is not to many people's taste. At the moment I am tending to prep my ribs, apply the rub, then just stick them back in the fridge while i'm starting the fire/setting up the smoker/stabilising temps. So the rub is on for no more than an hour max.

Also, looks to me like they were fairly meaty ribs, so I would have been aiming for closer to 6 hours than 4 (at 250) personally, altho you do hear such differences in cooking times from person to person. How 'clean' your bones are after cooking is a good indicator. Bones with a lot of meaty scraps still attached needed more time.

In my experience ribs are very tough to get them just right as there are so many variables, so don't be disheartened. Have at it again and keep improving!

[biggus_richus]

I did my second smoke on the weekend; made up half a batch of the modified BRITU rub above (thanks jotch) and applied it to four racks of ribs (about a tbsp per side) right before setting the cooker up.

Much, much better. Went with the minion method - a full chimney unlit + half lit + three chunks cherry wood. Took out half the ribs around four hours and the rest an hour later. Was surprised (and pleased) to see temperature still holding for a good couple of hours later. Took a bit of a punt and invited some (easily forgiving) friends around to be my guinea pigs and they were well happy.

Waitrose's quality was a bit down on last week - too many shiners, but all I could get. Will have to get on first name terms with a local butcher.