Bourbon-Bathed Baby Backs with Memphis Magic Dust

First thing when I started getting my prep work done for this recipe, I already had a feeling it was going to be an ordeal -- not because this is a hard recipe to follow, mind you, but because of how ridiculous Sacramento-area grocery stores are. Seriously, how hard should it be to find two racks of fresh baby-back ribs? Isn't that a fairly common thing for people to throw on a grill? The only place I could find with baby back ribs that weren't frozen into a freakin' ice cube was Winco, of all places. Anyway, first things first...

After I located some baby backs, I had to get moving on making the marinade or my ribs wouldn't have enough time to soak before I got them on my smoker. I've never used this marinade before, but how could I not try it when it has bourbon and a can of beer in the ingredients list?!  All in all, the "Bourbon Bath" consisted of:

• 1/2 cup of Jim Beam
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1 can of beer (I used Bud Light, since it's what I had on hand)
• 2 tablespoons soy sauce
• 2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
• 1 tablespoon chopped garlic
• 1 teaspoon black pepper

I stirred that up, brought it up to a boil, then let it cool for about an hour. Then I put my racks of ribs into large Ziploc bags and poured in the marinade, sealed 'em up, and put them in the fridge to do their thing until just before cook time. Not gonna lie, the marinade smelled awesome so I was feeling pretty hopeful!

(Make sure you remove the membrane or "fell" from the rib bones before you start marinading or seasoning the meat!)

While I was waiting for the meat to be grill-ready, I went about putting together my own spin on what's known as Memphis Magic Dust. And the beautiful thing about this rub -- it's easy and I had all the ingredients! All I did was take the items below, stir them together in a metal mixing bowl, and cover them up until the ribs were done marinating.

• 3/4 cup firmly packed dark brown sugar
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 1/2 cup paprika
• 1/4 cup kosher salt
• 1/4 cup garlic powder
• 2 tablespoons ground black pepper
• 2 tablespoons ground ginger powder
• 2 tablespoons onion powder
• 2 teaspoons rosemary powder

(I made a few minor changes to the original rub recipe to suit my personal taste.)

Dry rub texture pre-smoke

So, after a few hours, I removed the ribs from the wet marinade and applied the dry rub. I wrapped them back up in plastic and refrigerated them a bit longer. While the meat was taking to the dry rub, I went ahead and pre-heated the smoker. It usually takes about 45 mins to an hour for my smoker to get to its target temperature of 240 degrees. I also started soaking my wood chunks that would be going into the smoker.

Right on schedule, I put the ribs onto the smoker. I chose hickory wood to create my smoke, which is usually my choice when doing pork. I closed up the smoker, not to open it again for around 3 hours. Then I got myself situated with a bucket full of beers, popped a movie in the DVD player, and kicked back for a while.  (One of my favorite things about slow cooking on the smoker!)

Three hours later, the rib meat was beginning to retract nicely from the tip of the bones. I went ahead and wrapped them in foil with just a little bit of apple juice inside, then put them back on the smoker. (Apple juice is known to help tenderize meat while maintaining internal moisture. The addition of juice, however, is optional.)  And so back on they went for another hour.

Note the golden color and rib retraction:
good signs!

Just before going in foil wrap

An hour passed and I was chomping at the bit to remove the ribs and get them sauced! I pulled them off the smoker and found that they had done just what I had in mind:  stayed moist, retracted from the bone a tad bit more, and the dry rub had formed a nice "bark" or semi-hard crust. From there, I chose a store-bought barbecue sauce and added a light coating to the meaty surface of the ribs. Then, into a pre-heated 350 degree oven they went -- to caramelize and crisp the sauce a little.

After receiving a light coat of sauce

While the ribs were in the oven, I kept an eye on them to make sure I didn't burn the sauce (or meat, for that matter). Once fifteen minutes had gone by, I felt like the sauce was sufficiently darkened and it was "time." I pulled the ribs out of the oven and covered them in foil for 10 more minutes to rest before being sliced up.

See the red "smoke ring"?

Oh my goodness was I pleased when I began to cut into the ribs! I was able to pull the ribs apart easily with just a bit of a tug, no knife required -- now that's what they mean when they say "falling off the bone." I also noticed that there was a good smoke ring around the outer layer of the flesh (indicates depth of smoke penetration/flavor into the meat). In the pictures below, it's the outside part of the meat that looks a pink-ish red.  I was super-stoked at how well these ribs came out, especially in light of my recently failed rib experiment!

Finished product

I would have taken better pictures of the ribs plated up, but I was in a hurry to eat. Do you blame me?