Newbie Doing Ribs

[Shooter38]

I would like to do three slabs of St. Louis cut ribs on my 22 inch Weber kettle. My plan, and please advise if you see a problem with it, is to use one of the half circle charcoal baskets that came with the grill on one side of the lower grate, an aluminum water pan next to it, and the ribs on a rib rack on the upper grate above the water pan. I'll dry rub the ribs with kosher salt the previous day as recommended on this website and then a saltless rub prior to putting them on the grill. I will fill the charcoal basket almost to the top with unlit charcoal briquettes and hickory chunks and top it off with about 8 lit ones and a couple hickory chunks. I believe this is called the minion method if I'm not mistaken. I'll use the vents to try to maintain temp at 225 degrees until meat temp reaches 145. Is this a good plan or am I going wrong somewhere? Thanks!

[MBMorgan]

I'm sure one or more of the kettle people will be along shortly to offer feedback and advice ... meanwhile, welcome from Colorado!

[PJBowmaster]

Hey Shooter38 welcome to the Pit! First, I dig your handle. As for your plan, my first observation is that you might need a rib rack to fit 3 full slabs of St. Louis cut on the 22 inch kettle. I'll let others with more experience on the kettle weight-in on the water pan idea and charcoal plan. Cheers!!!

[Shooter38]

Thank you. This site has a lot of great info for a novice like myself and I'm glad I found it.

[PJBowmaster]

Seriously....I learned a TON from the free content on this site. But I have learned so much MORE since joining the Pit in late December. Dig through the topics in these forums. There is educational gold in there.....

[lschweig]

A hearty welcome from northern Illinois to you.

I think you will need to get the meat temp higher than 145 and getting a accurate measurement with ribs is most difficult. I would suggest using the bend test and/or the toothpick pobe test to

[DWCowles]

Welcome Shooter38

[Shooter38]

Thanks to all of you for the welcome! As for the meat temp, I thought that 145 is the target temp for pork. Is that not correct?

[RonB]

Welcome to The Pit. I do have some observations/suggestions.

Using one charcoal rail may not have enough charcoal without refilling. You might be better off using the rails as a fence with the straight sides facing the charcoal that is placed next to the outer edge of the kettle. I'd place your water pan on the rails to minimize direct heat reaching the ribs.
The object of the Minion method, or the snake method, or anything similar is to produce a small hot fire that burns cleanly. So I suggest adding the unlit charcoal to lit coals that are stacked in one corner of the rail. That way you will have a small hot fire that burns from one side to the other.
As mentioned above, 145* will not yield tender ribs. They will probably need to go around 200* +/-. If you don't have a rib rack, you can bend each rack into a circle and secure them by running a skewer all the way through. The overlapping ribs will likely not be as tender as the rest.

[Steve B]

I'm gonna agree with RonB but the only thing I would add to this, is the amount of hickory you are planning to add. For a first cook you might want to scale back. Might be too heavy on the smoke flavor. You can always add more next time

[Shooter38]

Thanks for the response. I really appreciate the advice. I know that I'll probably do a lot of my learning by making mistakes but I hope to minimize that by getting input from those of you who have more experience than me. Thanks again.

[Willy]

140°F IS the target for pork--tenderloin, chops, and loin roasts. You want to go far beyond that. If you maintain 225--250°F, they should take about five hours. I look for shrinkage (Seinfeld again) along the length of the bones--about 1/4 to 1/2-inch of bone should be exposed on each end. And, as others have noted, do the bend test. Pay attention and take notes. You'll be fine.

[LA Pork Butt]

I would use the snake or fuse method for what wIll Abe a 6 hour cook on St. Louis ribs. You find it on YouTube. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=XiGRbyg_zeI

[fuzzydaddy]

To help you figure out if the 3 racks will fit, take a piece of foil and shape it like one of the racks or cut a piece of paper. If the racks are different lengths or width, make a note of that. Then go to your kettle and check the length in 3 positions on your rib rack. Also, when you cook ribs on their side in a rib rack you'll want to flip them about 1/2 way through the cook as the top will cook faster than the bottom due to more heat higher up. It's also possible they will take around 7 hours.

And welcome to The Pit! We'd love to get an intro from you over in the Introduce Yourself channel when you get a minute.

Edit to add this: Your lid may hit the ribs so use foil for forming the rib template and put it in each rib rack position you'll use, put the lid on and see if it hits and bends the foil. Of course your ribs are not going to sit exactly on edge; they're going to flop over a bit. Try to keep them from laying on each other in the rib rack for good air flow/cooking.

[BBQbot]

We do a lot of ribs on Kettles , here are some thoughts:
1. Your setup sounds good! I don't have the charcoal basket you have, but if you can fit about 100 briquettes (about 5 lbs), that's more than you should need for this cook. Fill your water pan about half way.
2. Minion method with 8 lit coals as you describe - will work great.
3. These kettles are so leaky, you don't need the bottom opened a lot, start with enough to fit in a quarter. Open your top vent about half way, bring it up to temp slowly (give it a good 30 minutes) if it's coming up faster than that close down your top vent a bit, if slower than 45 minutes, open up the top vent a bit. Hold the temp using your top vent. If you can't get the temp up to 250 (some grills that are used a lot actually form a better seal on the lid from buildup), open your bottom vent enough to fit in 2 quarters.
4. Plan to cook for a couple hours longer than a single rack, you get a lot of cooling from the ribs next to each other on the rack. In the middle of the cook, you may want to change places of the ribs, as the middle rib will cook slower.
5. Don't let your temps get over 280. Pretty easy to control since you'll have your bottom vent only slightly open. This will minimize wind impacts to your temp as well.

[Shooter38]

Thanks for the tips. I appreciate it and will follow your advice. One question and I hope its not a stupid one. When adding course kosher salt to dry brine the ribs, do you salt only the meat side or both sides? My assumption would be just the meat side since ribs are not thick. Is that correct?

[HawkerXP]

Because the meat on ribs is thinner then say a chuck, I don't do a long dry brine. I'll add the salt first thing that morning or the night before. I do both because most of the meat is between the bones.

[Danjohnston949]

@Shooter 38, Welcome to "The Pit"! You are Now Enrolled in the BBQ Univ.! Attendance and Participation are Mandatory!
Enjoy "The Pit"! I think You might want to Get a S 'n S and a Drip & Griddle for Your Kettle ASAP! They Make Temp Control Easier!
Eat Well and Prosper! From a Backyard Cremator in Fargo ND, Dan