Beef Ribs....a little help?

[kccougar]

I got quite a surprise just now when I came home to prep the brisket for tomorrow. When my early Christmas present from cowboy arrived my wife was the one that unpacked it and put one pack in the fridge and the rest in the freezer. When I opened the vacuum-sealed pack from the fridge just now I found that I was looking at about 10 to 12 lbs of beef ribs instead of the brisket that I assumed I was going to be working with tonight. The briskets are all still frozen then.

Anyone smoked beef ribs before? How do they vary from pork ribs, which I've done a lot. This will be a new one for me. I think I'll rub with the same stuff I was planning for the brisket, but I don't know how long to smoke or what other steps I need to do for good beef ribs.

[Jeff Lebowski]

I got quite a surprise just now when I came home to prep the brisket for tomorrow. When my early Christmas present from cowboy arrived my wife was the one that unpacked it and put one pack in the fridge and the rest in the freezer. When I opened the vacuum-sealed pack from the fridge just now I found that I was looking at about 10 to 12 lbs of beef ribs instead of the brisket that I assumed I was going to be working with tonight. The briskets are all still frozen then.

Anyone smoked beef ribs before? How do they vary from pork ribs, which I've done a lot. This will be a new one for me. I think I'll rub with the same stuff I was planning for the brisket, but I don't know how long to smoke or what other steps I need to do for good beef ribs.

No advice from me, but I am wishing I had picked up some beef ribs on that purchase. I would like to try them. Very common at the BBQ joints in Austin.

[Drunk Tank]

Season like a brisket, cook like a brisket. Depending on the thickness, around 5-6 hours at 250° maybe longer. Should be very tender like a brisket. They will shrink up a lot, so don't be surprised.

And when I say cook like a brisket, I mean cook until probe tender.

[Drunk Tank]

Also, for those who may look for beef ribs in the store. Try to find beef short ribs, not beef back ribs. The beef back ribs generally do not have a lot of meat on them. Ask your butcher for a slab of beef short ribs and hopefully he'll be able to hook you up.

[kccougar]

These definitely have a lot of meat on them - but they come from cowboy so I'm not surprised. From what I've just been reading it seems like I should expect to cook for about 8 hours @ 225 in order for the meat to hit 205 and for all the fat and collagen to be fully rendered for these thick ribs.

[Drunk Tank]

These definitely have a lot of meat on them - but they come from cowboy so I'm not surprised. From what I've just been reading it seems like I should expect to cook for about 8 hours @ 225 in order for the meat to hit 205 and for all the fat and collagen to be fully rendered for these thick ribs.

That sounds like it will work. I'm hoping to get my cowboy order someday. Those look fantastic! Going to smoke some and also try the 72 hour short rib sous vide recipe I have.

[TripletDaddy]

Cook like a brisket meant wrap them eventually too?

[kccougar]

Cook like a brisket meant wrap them eventually too?

From the brief amount I've read, I haven't seen anything on wrapping. Looks pretty simple - just cook straight through to a fairly high internal temperature, low and slow.

[Drunk Tank]

Cook like a brisket meant wrap them eventually too?

Yes, preferably butcher paper, last couple of hours, but like brisket, not completely necessary.

[Sizzle]

These definitely have a lot of meat on them - but they come from cowboy so I'm not surprised. From what I've just been reading it seems like I should expect to cook for about 8 hours @ 225 in order for the meat to hit 205 and for all the fat and collagen to be fully rendered for these thick ribs.

Probably a dumb question, but why the wrap after the rub?

[hostile]

Those are some fantastic looking ribs. Lots of meat and marbling. I may need to get some for braised short ribs and beef bourguignon.

[kccougar]

Probably a dumb question, but why the wrap after the rub?

Because rubbed them early this afternoon, and I'm putting them on the smoker until 3:00 this morning. I had to transport transport them to our cabin.

[cowboy]

(This may look familiar to some of you) I got quite a bit of experience with beef ribs a few weeks ago, as I cooked up 300 pound of them with my smoker for the stake youth Friday. The rub was simple: Salt, pepper, garlic salt, and brown sugar. I started them around 7 on Thursday night, smoking them bone down with charcoal and apple wood. I started the charcoal, threw the ribs on, then threw the wood on and walked away. I came back and stoked the fire about 11 with another stove full of wood and let it go through the night. Temps may have gotten up to 350 when the fire was young and hot, but stayed below 250 for most of the night. The next morning, the ribs were warm but not hot, and my thermometer was below 100 (it nearly froze that night). We wrapped the ribs and kept them at a pretty constant 250 until 4:00 that afternoon, when we unwrapped them, dunked them in sauce, and grilled them for a few minutes before serving them. All in all, I was happy.

My short ribs have a lot of fat. There is a nice, 1/2-3/4 inch piece of meat on the outside, and then a wedge of fat interspersed with meat that ranges from 1-3 inches thick, then bones with the meat in the middle. We split them into three products when we unwrapped them. We took the outer piece of meat and served it stand-alone, then picked the meat from the fat wedge and served it as an un-sauced pulled beef, and finally dunked and grilled the bones on their own. Obviously, with that kind of volume there was a range in doneness, with some ribs completely falling apart at unwrapping and others a little dry from the all-night smoke. I found that if the outer piece was still dry after wrapping, I could dunk, grill, and repeat several times with an end product that was a touch dry, but that had so much caramelized sauce it didn't matter.

KC, my opinion is that you don't have to wrap them if you don't want to. Instead, buy a disposable foil roaster pan to throw them in, cover it, set the oven/cooker at 280, and walk away. If you plan to sauce and grill them like I did, pull them out when you can pull meat off the top of the ribs in strings, but before they are so cooked that they fall apart. Good luck.

[cowboy]

That sounds like it will work. I'm hoping to get my cowboy order someday. Those look fantastic! Going to smoke some and also try the 72 hour short rib sous vide recipe I have.

Sorry. You guys who haven't had your orders completely filled have been very patient. I promise I'll fill more orders Monday, but the last three weeks have been a nightmare.

[Drunk Tank]

Sorry. You guys who haven't had your orders completely filled have been very patient. I promise I'll fill more orders Monday, but the last three weeks have been a nightmare.

No complaint from me. Looking forward to them.