Too Chewy Ribs

My guests prefer ribs with meat falling from the bone. Just smoked baby backs (1/2 wet, 1/2 dry recipes from How To Grill). They looked great, tasted great, but it was impossible to clean the bone. I smoked them 3 hours at 220F, then wrapped them in foil, and cooked them another hour.

I cooked on Brinkmann Smoke&Pit Professional which I have "tuned" with a steel plate b/w the firebox and cooking chamber. The max temp is 220F with a full chimney starter load of charcoal. I also had a pan of hot H2O+apple juice in the chamber.

As a purist, I hate to precook in the oven or boil them. However, it is no fun serving tough ribs. Any thoughts, advice, or ruminations would be appreciated. Thanx.

Stik2UrRib

I think you cooked them too long. The time seems excessive, especially at 220.

Apoc

Just to give you contrary reasoning, I'm guessing you didn't cook them long enough. It should be easy to tell. Was it burnt or fleshy? If it's chewy because it's fleshy, you didn't cook them long enough. Depending on the weather and other variables, it could take six or seven hours to cook ribs. Baby backs are smaller than spare ribs, but pork doesn't really start to fall off the bone until it reaches about 170-180 degrees. Best thing to do is make extra and test one every hour or so. Or test a rack if you've been drinking....

I agree that you might have cooked them too long. Last weekend I cooked 4 racks of ribs (basic pork spareribs, not babybacks), indirect heat, combination of hickory and natural charcoal. Had to remove 1/2 a rack to feed a few kids about an hour-and-a-half into it, and they were perfect. Then the main dinner party had to wait about 40 minutes for one guest who was conducting an important interview on the phone. The ribs were still great, but tougher, dried out at the edges and ends, and just not as succulent. have no idea what the temp was inside the grill, but it seemed low and smoky enough....

Undercooked. Unless these ribs did not have an ounce of moisture left in them, overcooking them in foil would have falling off the bone to the point of having no real texture in the meat - basically mush. At 220 degrees, 4 hours is a good starting point. But, depending upon your ribs, they could easily go for hours more. What kind of internal temp did you pull them at?

Thanks for the replies. Looks like I'll need to cook at least twice more, once shorter and once longer. Aww, too bad, huh? I think checking the internal temp is probably the key. Thanks again.

My vote also goes to undercooked. I find it usually takes about 6 hours give or take for spares. An hour or two less for babybacks.

My suggestion to you would be to not only try it two more times, but keep a log book of each time you do it. How long, what temp, what and how much wood, when you put the foil on etc. Keep referring back to it each time you cook and make adjustments accordingly. Eventually, you'll get the perfect recipe for your family.

On that note, ribs for my family are only acceptable dry using Steve's Puerto Rican Pig Powder for the rub.

Scott

Theo1011 wrote:

I agree that you might have cooked them too long. Last weekend I cooked 4 racks of ribs (basic pork spareribs, not babybacks), indirect heat, combination of hickory and natural charcoal. Had to remove 1/2 a rack to feed a few kids about an hour-and-a-half into it, and they were perfect. Then the main dinner party had to wait about 40 minutes for one guest who was conducting an important interview on the phone. The ribs were still great, but tougher, dried out at the edges and ends, and just not as succulent. have no idea what the temp was inside the grill, but it seemed low and smoky enough....

Theo1011,
If you have to wait like that , try putting the ribs in a cooler. You will keep them nice and warm but you won't dry them out.

JohnnyG

i have found that depending on the type of rib you are cooking that boiling for 20 - 30 minutes helps to make the muscle tissue release from the bone then spice and grill as normal and i uasually have perfect ribs everytime