Monday, September 10, 2007

So it’s taken a while for me to determine that we needed a set plan for meals during the week with our nutso schedule. Mondays and Fridays I cook since I work at home. Wednesdays are crock pot days since I’m at the office. We’ll have small group starting up in a few weeks, which will mean there’s no time for cooking. It’s got to be ready to eat when I get home. Tuesdays and Thursdays are leftover days.

I was going through the meat bin in the freezer the other day, planning this week’s meals, when I noticed the package of spareribs. Out they came along with stew beef. Beef stew in the crock pot is the Wednesday plan. This meant the ribs were either for tonight or Friday. Since Beau bought corn on the cob that we wanted to eat up, we had the ribs with the corn tonight.

I remembered seeing a recipe for ribs in my latest mag from Cooking Club of America (yes, I’m a member - life member, no less). In it they suggested grilling the rack of ribs standing on end - in a circle like a crown roast. This way the meat can self-baste and won’t burn because of the flame.

I made the rub in their recipe, although I don’t have smoked paprika, so I thought I’d toast it in a saute pan for a few minutes. I don’t know if that did anything except smell up my house. I took another look in my spice rack to see what I could use to supplement to get that smokey flavor and found some mesquite grill seasoning mix. I added about 1-2 tsp to the rub mixture.

I was working still when Beau started up the grill. Unbeknownst to me he got the rack on the grill before I could remind him about the rub. They had been on there for about 10 minutes when I pulled them off and rubbed in the seasonings. Fortunately, it stuck well. I rolled it back into the crown and put it back on the grill.

I then grabbed two russet potatoes, scrubbed them, wrapped them in foil and put them in with the ribs on the grill.

The plan was to grill the corn, too, but we have a small grill and there would have been no room at the point when the corn needed to go on. The ribs would have been laid out with the BBQ sauce. So I put the ears (still with husks on) in the oven to roast.

Let me tell you - that was one delicious meal. I can’t wait for the leftovers tomorrow. We have ribs and corn leftover and Beau can put two potatoes in the oven well enough (actually, he makes the best baked potatoes - he slathers them with olive oil and salt before baking). It’s a myth that you want the meat to fall off the bones - you want the meat to pull away from the bones easily when you tug on it. Our ribs were cooked perfectly - the meat was tender and pulled off the bones easily. And tasted scrumptious.

It was good, if messy, dinner. *satisfied sigh*