Out of nowhere yesterday, my girlfriend told me yesterday that she had ribs. Ribs? What the heck did she mean? No, she meant that she had a rack of ribs. For me. I was flummoxed and asked where this had come from. "My colleague," she answered. Now I'm really confused. "Why did your colleague give you ribs?" I asked. "She got them from her hometown," my gf replied, as if that answered anything. "What kind or ribs? Pork? Beef?" I only wanted to present those two options, I wasn't really looking forward to any other kind of animal's ribs. "Pork ribs," she replied. Look, the mystery I'm trying to solve here is why ribs just dropped out of the sky and into my lap. If any of you remember my older stories, it is next to impossible to find racks of ribs here. They all chop them up small into tiny pieces and you have to get the right butcher in a good mood in order to get some ribs cut the right way.
So I play Sherlock Holmes, follow a trail of deduction, and by careful questioning I decipher that a coworker of hers went to her hometown to celebrate the recent Chinese New Year, where someone had butchered a pig, and my gf having told her that I like ribs, saved the ribs for me and transported them back to the city. Whew, mystery solved. I was a bit worried how long the ribs had spent unrefrigerated, but fortunately the hometown was nearby so that wasn't an issue. So, now I have a rack of ribs ready to go. I'd better cook them today, and not keep them in the fridge too long.
Looks OK I guess! Nine ribs altogether, the scale says 4.9 pounds. They just cut the spine off and these are the whole ribs. I don't know how I'm going to cut them into baby backs and St. Louis cut without a saw. I'm not looking forward to peeling off the membrane from under the rack. That is always a super pain in the ass and even with a butter knife prying, I could never get it to peel evenly. It would just break and then the only thing I could try to do was rip at it with pliers and hope it would peel. Nope. Ended up cooking with most of it still on.
And I just so happen to have a very specific set of ingredients available, among them rosemary powder, ginger powder, onion powder, and paprika. Sounds pretty mundane but try finding any of these in the spice rack at the grocery store around here - no way. I bought them from my Christmas vacation in the States specially with the intent of making Meathead's Memphis Dust. It'll be my first time using it and I'm looking forward to it. However it's going to be in the oven instead of trying out my new smoke-n-sear, as it's still too cold to go outside and sit around (52 degrees brr!) Unfortunately I did not look ahead far enough and bring the liquid smoke for the oven ribs recipe. Oh well, it'll go on the list for the next time to bring back.
So I play Sherlock Holmes, follow a trail of deduction, and by careful questioning I decipher that a coworker of hers went to her hometown to celebrate the recent Chinese New Year, where someone had butchered a pig, and my gf having told her that I like ribs, saved the ribs for me and transported them back to the city. Whew, mystery solved. I was a bit worried how long the ribs had spent unrefrigerated, but fortunately the hometown was nearby so that wasn't an issue. So, now I have a rack of ribs ready to go. I'd better cook them today, and not keep them in the fridge too long.
Looks OK I guess! Nine ribs altogether, the scale says 4.9 pounds. They just cut the spine off and these are the whole ribs. I don't know how I'm going to cut them into baby backs and St. Louis cut without a saw. I'm not looking forward to peeling off the membrane from under the rack. That is always a super pain in the ass and even with a butter knife prying, I could never get it to peel evenly. It would just break and then the only thing I could try to do was rip at it with pliers and hope it would peel. Nope. Ended up cooking with most of it still on.
And I just so happen to have a very specific set of ingredients available, among them rosemary powder, ginger powder, onion powder, and paprika. Sounds pretty mundane but try finding any of these in the spice rack at the grocery store around here - no way. I bought them from my Christmas vacation in the States specially with the intent of making Meathead's Memphis Dust. It'll be my first time using it and I'm looking forward to it. However it's going to be in the oven instead of trying out my new smoke-n-sear, as it's still too cold to go outside and sit around (52 degrees brr!) Unfortunately I did not look ahead far enough and bring the liquid smoke for the oven ribs recipe. Oh well, it'll go on the list for the next time to bring back.
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