Fine Tuning Habañero Lime Ribs

Spent some time fine tuning the recipe in this previous post:
BBQ Ribs With Lime and Habañero Sauce

It was good the last time, and this time it was even better. Here are the differences:
* Brought the temp down a bit - slow smoked at 190-210 degrees with hickory, cherry and a little mesquite.
* Used a bit more rub and lime on top of the mustard and habañero slather.
* When it came time to apply the spicy BBQ sauce I applied it 4 times instead of 3 (and more of it each time). I also made the spicy BBQ sauce thicker and sweeter with more maple syrup, more Jack Daniels and less water.
* Foil wrapped with 90 minutes left in the 5 hour cook.

They came out nice and sticky and moister with just the right amount of sweet to go with the tangy heat. Definitely an improvement that I can recommend :thumb:









Thanks for reading this post :-D

SmokinIllini said:

Looks awesome! Do you use any foiling liquid? When are you doing the 4 sauce applications?

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When I wrapped I mixed in extra JD and apple juice with the same sauce I used to baste and poured it in the foil under the bone-bend then sealed the foil. Wrapped the foil tented not tight wrapped so the liquid sits on the foil and doesn't wash off the bark and hardened sauce on the meat. Didn't use too much of the thinner sauce-liquid and made sure the bones were down and the ribs bent away from the extra thin juice because the sauce should come out sticky not wet.

Sauce was applied at 1:00 in, 1:45 in, 2:30 in and at foil wrap (3:30 in).

martyleach said:

Those look great but I gotta tell you I have never cooked ribs at that low of a temp because I've heard it dries them out. 220 is the way people used to cook ribs. Now it is 250-295. They cook a lot faster and don't dry out. 2 hours cooking, foil and 30-45mins.....done

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Thanks. I'll give some ribs a try at the standard 275 again soon and do a comparison post :thumb:

You are right - if you don’t apply some extra care the longer cook time tends to dry out the product . At first we had issues with drying but not anymore. We played around and found that for long, slow cooks it helps to place pyrex dishes with extra water in the smoker and foil wrap toward the end of the cook adding some juice that matches or compliments the seasoning being used. We double wrap the foil sealing it tight with heavy duty foil so it doesn’t tear and leak the juice out. If the product is a bit too wet at the end, we will place it back in the smoker for 10 or 15 to remove some moisture from the bark.

We've been cooking pretty much everything low and slow in this manner as long as we have the time. It seems to us that the flavor is better/smokier, the bark seems more caramelized and the connective tissues in the meat seem a bit more tender.

Cooking ribs this way takes extra time and fuss, but for us they have been coming out really nice and we are not finding them to be dry at all :-D