Spit Rib Roast

Christmas tradition here is rib roast -- this year I'd like to do it on the grill. Anybody have any advice/experience with spit roasting beef rib roasts? All ideas would be greatly appreciated.

Max - The recipe is "HTG" would work for you, the cooking would be very similar on a spit, I believe that steve even says so as a side note. However be aware of a few things, first you will need a robust spit/motor to turn the thing, and second clearance could be an issue I was going to spit mine (read "Holiday Feast" for my experience and other do's and dont's) but I wanted to keep the bone in and the ribs stuck out too much so that they would have hit the gfrill grates causing the roast not to turn. This could be avoided by bone sawing (yourself or your butcher) the ribs flush with the meat. I don't know if I'd use the infrared burner (if you have one) to roast the whole thing. It might cook too quick, someone else may have more info here. Last bit of advice make sure you have an empty drip pan these suckers put off massive ammounts of drippings, and therefore indirect cooking is essential if you want to avoid fires.
Good Luck and Enjoy!

Hey Grand Scale,

For Clearance, couldn't you just remove your grate? I do this when spit roasting chicken....with the grates removed, I only have to worry about clearance with the rotisserie burner. Maybe with your rig it is not possible.

Kl8ton-
There you go with those great ideas again!!
I will remember that next time, I could even keep the flavorized bars in.
Thanks, I would have never thought of that.

When I asked this question I didn't realize I had a source close at hand -- my uncle has done rotissed (is that really a verb?) rib roast (now that's fun to say!). When he did it, he had the butcher remove the bones, then tie them back on. Instead of looking like a big comma, it looked like a log. I think he still had to remove the grate, but the ends of the bones didn't blacken.

Grand Scale -- do you think it would be possible to catch the drippings in a pan on the flavorizer bars? I'd love to make jus -- isn't half the point of roast beef the jus? I usually rotisse with the front and rear burners only (med to low), so the pan wouldn't be directly over the heat. I'm hoping that will keep it from burning.

In my uneducated opinion that sounds like you've got a good plan Max. Good Luck and Enjoy! Let us know how you make out.

P.S. I love your signature line!

Just a small note about rib roasts...
Before you cook them, use a sharp, narrow knifwe (I use a 6" utility knife) to remove the meat from the ribs. Place a good portion of whatever herb mixture you're using for seasoning on the bones, and the rest on the other sides of the meat. Tie the meat back on the bones and cook. This method has two great benefits: bone-in roasts are jujicier than boneless, and it's very easy to carve. Snip the strings and carve away!

I gotr this tip from Cook's Illustrated magazine

PaulP

If you haven't seen it yet, check out the new issue of Up In Smoke. Steven writes about smoking a prime rib roast for New Year's Eve.

I'm jealous of all of you making a prime rib. I will be working New Year's eve and will have to wait on my feast.

Well, picked up the roast today! God what a beautiful piece of meat! And following my uncle (and PaulP's advice) I got the butcher to whack the bones off an tie 'em back to the roast. Now the bad boy's dry aging in the fridge.

Haven't settled on rotissing or not -- not sure how powerful the motor is. Time enough for that decision later.

Sides: Yorkshire puddings, Chipotle mashed sweet potato, braised swiss chard. I'll rely on guests to supply dessert. Yep, gonna be a goood Christmas!

Thanks for the suggestions.

P.S. Grand Scale -- the sig (I'm told is a Spanish proverb) It reminded me of Robert Heinlein's short story about a man so lazy that he becomes fabulously wealthy inventing labor saving devices. My Hero!

MaxDog, you dog! You got me hungry!!!
You have a wonderful meal planned. Please be sure to post the results and if possible it would be great to see some photos.

Have a great Christmas!!!

Well -- the event is over and it was (mostly) a smashing success. Rotissing the roast worked well. I just love that self basting action! In the oven, I ususally use a probe thermometer and I really miss that on the roto. I kept checking the thing cause I was afraid I'd over cook the bugger. Guess we need to invent a cordless probe thermometer -- like thermistor you can insert and read with a RF pulse. That's not asking too much is it?

The down side -- the jus was awful. I put a pan between the flames and the meat, caught a buch of fat, but very little meaty drippings. I did get some black char crust (the consistency of cracked pepper). I drained the fat for Yorkshire Pudding (more about that later), deglazed the pan with wine and water and had a lovely charcoal flavored jus. Not sure why rotissing produced so little meat drippings. Next time I may try just doing it on the grill without the roto.

My other observation with the roto -- when you let the meat rest, leave it on the spit. I lost a whole lot of juice during that twenty minutes. I don't know for sure that it made a difference, but it sure seemed like more juice ended up on the board then usual.

As for Yorkshire pudding -- anybody got experience with this. We filled the kitchen with smoke -- although there was just a bit of oil in each cup (1/4 inch?) a whole lot ended up on floor of the oven. Bride o' mine like the puddings, but questioned whether they were worth the stench.

Anyway -- a success, most of the way around. And the looks on our friends faces! Classic. Oh, and there wasn't too much. The left overs made great sandwiches for the last two days. Much better than Thanksgiving turkey.