Chipotle BBQ Ribs (Updated for Oven Prep)

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My chipotle-tomato sauce delivers American style BBQ pork ribs with a perfect balance of sweet and spicy so even your kids will eat them and love them. Although the ingredients of my Chipotle BBQ sauce are typical of many barbecue sauces, the smoky and hot flavor of chipotle chile doesn’t require numerous additional spices.  And don’t be afraid of the word Chipotle; most of the “hotness” of chipotle chile burns off during the grilling process.  Optionally, accompany these Chipotle ribs with Mexican recipes for jicama freshened with lime juice, and grilled lemon marinated nopales (cactus).

Cooking ribs in the oven provides uniform temperature control and consistence results better than the grill.  Here I have provided a grilling and oven options for preparing these great chipotle ribs.

 

Ingredients

Ribs and Sauce

1 large rack pork sparerib (St. Louis cut )

1 can tomatoes 14oz (400 grams)

2 tablespoons tomato paste (optional) 

2 whole cloves garlic 

¾  cup onion roughly chopped

¼ cup honey or to taste for sweetness

2 tablespoons molasses 

¼ cup red vinegar 

1 tablespoon olive oil

3 chile chipotles finely diced for rubbing ribs  (buy a 7 oz can of chipotle en adobo)

3-6 chile chipotles and adobo sauce  (depending on hotness of the chiles)

1 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon crushed oregano

1 bottle of apple juice or beer for basting. (Grilling method only)

 

Salad

4 medium paddles of nopal (Cactus)

2 lemons

2 lbs of jicama

2 limes

Serves 4 

 

Prepare Ribs 

Purchase your spareribs in the St. Louis cut or trim them yourself from a whole rack of spareribs. Instructions on trimming spareribs can be found in grilling cookbooks, youtube or on the internet. Trim the membrane off the back of the ribs and rub both sides with 3 finely diced chipotle chiles. Wrap the ribs in plastic-wrap and place them in the refrigerator to marinate for 6 hours (2 hours if you are short on time) prior to cooking. But always give yourself time to bring the ribs back to room temperature before grilling.

BBQ Sauce

Using a blender, puree the tomato, garlic, onion, oregano, tomato paste, olive oil, 3-6 chipotle chiles and adobo sauce. See Notes on “hotness” of chipotle. Salt to taste and thin out with water to a consistency sufficient to mop or brush the sauce. Keep in mind you want the sauce more thick than thin and teak the ingredients to suit your preference for taste, heat and sweetness.

 

 

Oven Ribs Option 

(Modified from Serious Eats Website )

Preheat oven to 250°F;  Set a wire rack in a rimmed baking sheet and place the oven shelf in center position. Remove and discard plastic from the ribs.  Wrap the  rib rack in foil, sealing it tightly, and set on prepared racked baking sheet. Bake ribs for 2 hours. Remove and discard foil.

Increase oven to 325 °F.  Return to oven, meaty side up, and continue to cook until a toothpick or skewer can be pushed into meat with minimal resistance, about 1 1/2 hours longer. (Cooking times can vary quite a bit depending on the exact size of rib racks and the oven being used.)  A good indicator of cooked rubs is when the meat has pulled back from the bones.

To Finish: Increase oven to 400°F. Brush or mop the ribs with the chipotle sauce, return to oven and cook, meaty side up, until well browned, 5 to 10 minutes. Repeat every 5 minutes and within 15-20 minutes you should have a nice cap of chipotle BBQ sauce over the ribs.  Cut ribs between bones, if desired; serve, passing additional sauce at the table.

 

Grilled Ribs Option

Sear the ribs on direct heat and cook them using indirect heat.

Instructions on how to setup your gas or charcoal grill for direct and indirect cooking can be found in grilling cookbooks, youtube or on the internet. Here is my low-tech method to judge the temperature in case you don’t have a thermometer on your grill:  Hold your hand 5 inches from the heat. If you can stand the heat only a second, it is a very hot fire; if you can hold on for 2 seconds, it is a hot fire; if you can bear it for 3 or 4 seconds, it’s a medium; 5  seconds is medium-low fire and 6 seconds is low fire.

1) Heat your outdoor grill to 450 degrees (very hot – 1 second rule) and sear each side of the rack for 4 minutes.

2) Lower the grill temperature  to 250 to 275  degrees (medium-low – 5 second rule).  On a gas grill lower the burner dials and on a charcoal grill close the vents.

3) Place the rack bone side down and cook using indirect heat without sauce covered for 3 hours. Baste the ribs with beer once every 30 minutes.

4) After 3 hours the meat should pull back from the bones and will have turned a reddish brown.  Set up your grill for direct heat again and brush or mop the ribs with the chipotle sauce. Repeat basting every 5 minutes for 30 minutes.

 

After about 30 minutes you will have a thick layer of glazed sauce.  Cut the rack into individual ribs and serve with extra sauce on the side.

 

Plating

To complete my Mexican food  theme I chose citrus flavored Nopal and  Jícama to counter-balance the rich flavor to BBQ sauce.  You can also achieve a similar balance with a green salad with a light vinaigrette and corn-on-the-cob.  Serve with extra sauce on the side.  Buen Provecho!

 

Prepare Nopales

Nopal paddles, aka cactus, are usually sold trimmed of spines but you may want to remove the nodes using a knife followed by a good rinse in water.  If you steal cactus from a neighbor’s drought tolerant landscape or a hillside along the freeway, be sure to use gloves to remove the spines.

Cut each paddle into fingers as seen in the photo, add the juice of 2 lemons, 1 tablespoon of olive oil, salt and sprinkle with ½ teaspoon of oregano.  Refrigerate 2- 4 hours.

 

 

Then, grill each side until slightly charred.

 

 

Prepare Jícama

Jícama is a vegetable but tastes like a fruit and I serve it with the ribs because it is a very light and refreshing counter-balance to the rich BBQ sauce.

Wash and dry the jícama. Peel skin using a potato peeler.  Cut the jicama into 1 inch square sticks, cover with lime juice, mix with finely diced cilantro and salt to taste. (In the picture below you will notice I substituted chives for cilantro, but I recommend cilantro. )

 

Notes

Chipotle peppers are smoked jalapeños and are usually super hot but sometimes not. If you think your sauce is too hot, do not worry because most of the “hotness” burns off during the grilling process. The adobo sauce that comes in the can with the chipotle peppers already has spices included — so for this reason I limit the number of additional spices in my sauce.    Most american supermarkets sell canned chipotle chile.  Jícama and nopal can be found in your Mexican supermarkets or deli stores.

 

Let me know how it turns out! And please share this post with your Friends on Facebook, Twitter or Pinterest.

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