Smoked Baby Back Ribs
Ribs. I had ribs for lunch.
Full Recipe Video:
Servings: 4-6
Ingredients:
2 racks baby back pork ribs (membrane removed)
Yellow mustard
Dry pork rub of your choice
Apple juice
Apple cider vinegar
12 tbsp. butter
Brown sugar
Honey
Water
Tools:
Wood Chips (wood type your choice, we used Hickory)
Loaf pan or small grill safe container
Large Cutting Board
Aluminum foil
Smoking ribs on the grill is a time intensive labor of love (4 hours total smoking time). We highly suggest making sure you have all your tools and ingredients organized ahead of time to make this process as seamless as possible. There are just as many tools as ingredients! And order of operations is important for efficiancy.
We got 2 full racks from the butcher and had the butcher remove the outer membrane. This must be done - whether it’s by you or the butcher. It’s takes a really sharp knife and a little skill, so we left it to the professionals and asked the butcher to remove the membrane. Why not? Cut each rack in half so you have 4 evenly sized racks (you can do this at home).
We add the rub to the ribs a few hours before grill time. You can certainly do this earlier or the night before, but 2-3 hours prior should suffice.
Cover a large baking sheet with foil (easier cleanup). Place the 4 small racks of ribs on the baking sheet. Rub each rack, both sides, with a healthy layer of yellow mustard. Then sprinkle each rib rack, both sides, with a dry pork rub. This is easily found online or at your local grocery or butcher. Cover the ribs completely on both sides with the rub, but not so much that you can no longer see the meat through the rub. Cover with a piece of foil until you’re ready to grill.
Sometime prior to grilling, fill a spray dispenser or spray bottle (whatever you have) with about 1 cup apple juice and 1/4 cup apple cider vinegar. The ratio is not terribly important, but this should be enough to last you through your grilling cycle. Bring this with you out to the grill.
Take about half of your wood chips and soak them in water in a large bowl for 30 minutes right before you’re planning to grill. You will want some of them dry, and some of them soaked. This prevents the wood from igniting in your smoker box and getting too hot. After 30 minutes, take your soaked chips out of the water and place them on a paper towel to pat dry. You will want both your dry chips and soaked chips outside at the grill with you.
Turn on only one of your side burners and heat grill to 275 degrees.
Once your grill is to temperature, open your smoker box and add a thin layer of dry chips to the box. Fill the remainder, until the box is 3/4 of the way full, with your soaked chips and close the lid. Take your smoker box and place it on the side of the grill that is lit and close the lid of the grill. We want to get the chips nice and hot so they start to produce smoke. The rib racks will go on the opposite side of the grill.
Occassionally peek at the smoker box - once you see smoke coming through the vents, take your stainless steel rib rack holder, put it on the side of the grill that is NOT lit, and place your 4 racks of ribs in the slots. Using a tong, move the smoker box over to the same side of the grill as the rib racks directly in front of the racks.
Fill your loaf pan (or grill safe container) with some water and place it on the lit side of the grill. This helps maintain moisture while the ribs are cooking. Close the grill lid.
You will want to check on the ribs every 45 minutes, but no more than this! Don’t keep opening and closing the lid of the grill, as you want the heat/smoke sealed.
Checking every 45 minutes to:
1) Make sure your smoker box isn’t igniting. Frequently watch the temperature gauge on the grill. If you see it spike, it’s likely because your wood chips have ignited. If you followed the instructions with the soaked chips, this shouldn’t happen, but if it does, open the smoker box lid and throw more of the soaked chips in the box to extinguish the flames and cool it down.
2) You will want to spray your rib racks with the apple juice/apple cider vinegar mixture every 45 minutes.
After two hours of cooking, using your grill tongs, flip each rib rack around in the metal rack so the back is now facing the front. Close the grill lid.
3 hours in, we are going to add our “sweet and butter rub” to each rack. Rip out 4 pieces of aluminum foil. One at a time, remove a single rack to a piece of foil, meaty side up. Knife 3 tbsp. of butter onto the ribs, sprinkle with a dusting of brown sugar, and top with a generous drizzle of honey. Repeat for every rack. Wrap each rack tightly creating a foil packet around your racks, and place each rack back into the metal rack holder. Cover the grill lid again and let cook for an additional hour. Once the ribs are wrapped in foil, you will not need to continue to spray with the apple juice/vinegar mixture.
After 4 long hours, your ribs should be thoroughly cooked and tender. Remove each rack to a large cutting board. With a sharp knife, cut each rib between the bone, plate, and serve!
Notes:
As you can gather from the recipe, the prep and cooking time require some commitment. Pick a day to smoke ribs when you have nothing else going on! Invite some people over, entertain yourself with good movies, music, drinks, and conversation, and enjoy the fruits of your labor.
We watched and read a lot of online instruction and consulted experienced friends in the smoking game. We did the research, ran some tests, and made some mistakes, so that you don’t have to! If you follow all the instructions above, you should have no smoking mishaps, and a beautiful finished product to enjoy.
All the tools we used can be found in our Amazon Shop.
