Cue-Vide Baby Back Ribs

For Memorial Day this year I wanted to try something a little different and combine two cooking techniques that I frequently use, smoking and sous vide.  My local grocery store had baby back ribs on sale for the holiday weekend so I bough a rack and went about trying to plan my cook.  After doing a web search figure out time/temps for baby backs I settled on 149°f for 24 hours.

After removing the rack of ribs from the cryovac packaging they came in they were rinsed, cut in two (so they'd fit in my 12 quart Cambro) and the membrane removed by loosening a bit with a skewer, grabbing it with a paper towel and peeling it off.  For the rub I mixed the remains of two types of commercial rubs I had in the pantry from last season, Bad Byron's Butt Rub and McCormick's Brown Sugar Bourbon Seasoning in roughly equal portions.  I filled up a 12 quart Cambro container to the 10 liter mark, attached my ChefSteps Joule circulator, put on the lid I had cut to fit the circulator and used the Joule app to set the bath temp to 149°f.  While the bath was heating I liberally applied the rub mix to the ribs and vacuum sealed them with a FoodSaver.  Because this was going to be a long cook I double bagged the ribs, first each 1/2 slab was vacuum sealed in individual 8" wide bags then those were put in to an 11" wide bag and vacuum sealed again.

Ribs tend to float in the bath so I used a couple of large, stainless steel spoons to weigh down the bag during the cook.  Once the bath was at temp and the ribs added I set the timer on my Joule app for 24 hours and just let them soak, checking back occasionally to make sure the bag was still fully submerged and repositioning the spoons when needed.  The cook was started on Saturday and when the timer went off on Sunday we were on the other side of town.  This is when wi-fi connectivity comes in handy, when the timer went off I was able to lower the set temp of the bath down to 130°f remotely so the ribs wouldn't overcook and get mushy by the time I finally made it home a few hours later.  The ribs were removed from the bath and chilled overnight.

On Memorial Day morning I grabbed my Bradley Smoker from the storage shed and hooked it up using my homemade PID controller set to 250°f.  There were still a few pecan bisquettes left in the hopper so I left those and added some Jim Beam bisquettes on top.  The ribs were added once the chamber temp got to 225°f, below are some baked beans with a little diced onion, green pepper and garlic added.  After an hour on smoke the ribs were sauced with a bottled barbeque sauce (Simple Truth Barbeque Sauce) that I doctored by adding a little balsamic vinegar from Old Town Oil and some of the rub mix.  The ribs were put back on the smoker for about 20 more minutes for the sauce to set.

After bringing them in the ribs and beans were put under the broiler for a few minutes to get a little char on them and to make sure the sauce was nice and set.

Here are the ribs after cutting, they're extremely juicy and tender.  Easy to bite through, as close to the "perfect bite" I've seen on barbeque competition shows as I've ever been able to do at home.  I was concerned that putting rub on at the beginning would make the finished ribs too salty, but that was not the case.  They had just the right salt level and the flavors of the rub permeated the meat.

The final plate, next to the ribs are the smoked baked beans, gochujang coleslaw (bagged coleslaw mix with a dressing of mayonnaise, gochujang, sherry vinegar, celery salt, salt, shichimi togarashi, minced dry garlic and minced dry onion) and a Caesar salad.