center cut ribs

If you want to produce award-winning ribs, here is a recipe to help you get it done. Once you have a few contests under your belt, feel free to make minor tweaks to make the recipe uniquely yours.

Award Winning Competition Ribs Recipe

slab St. Louis cut ribs

Morton Coarse Kosher Salt per pound of meat

mayonnaise

margarine

honey

brown sugar

apple juice

BBQ sauce

Prep. Remove the membrane from the slabs of ribs (read more on removing the membrane here).

Season the ribs with Kosher salt. If you can, give the salt 1 to 2 hours to be absorbed. The process of salting in advance is called dry brining. The rule of thumb is 1/2 teaspoon of kosher salt per pound of meat, but ribs consist of only about 50% meat, so use about 1/4 teaspoon per pound. You can simply eyeball it by sprinkling on the same amount of salt you would sprinkle on the ribs if they were served to you unseasoned. 

Fire up. Prepare a smoker for indirect cooking. Alternatively, you can set up a charcoal grill for 2-zone cooking by placing a chimney full of lit charcoal briquets on one side of the grill&#39;s charcoal grate in order to create direct and indirect cooking zones. Adjust the smoker or grill vents to bring the temperature to about 225°F (107.2°C) and add two to three chunks of your favorite smoking wood to the charcoal for flavor. On a gas grill, adjust the temperature knobs so that one half of the grill is off and the other half is heated enough to maintain a temperature of approximately 225°F (107.2°C) on the indirect side.

Once the smoker or grill is ready, brush both sides of ribs with mayonnaise and season with Meathead's Memphis Dust dry rub.

Cook. Place the slabs of ribs meat side up on the main cooking grate as far away from the heat source as possible. Cover the smoker or grill. Allow the ribs to smoke until the meat just begins to shrink back from the ends of the bones, about 3 1/2 hours.

Lay out two double layers of heavy-duty aluminum foil approximately eight inches longer than the ribs. Cut the stick of butter into 1/2 tablespoon pieces  and top each double layer of foil with two tablespoons of butter, one tablespoon of honey drizzled over the butter, and two tablespoons brown sugar sprinkled over the top. Lay the ribs meat side down on the butter, honey and brown sugar mixture. Place another two tablespoons margarine, a tablespoon of honey, and two tablespoons brown sugar evenly on top of the bone side of each slab of ribs. Fold up the sides of the foil to create a boat, pour in the apple juice, and loosely seal the foil.

Place the foiled ribs sealed side up on the smoker or grill and cook until the ribs shrink back from the ends of the bones by 1/4 to 1/2 inch (6.4 to 12.7 mm), about 1 hour.

Remove the ribs from the smoker or grill and cautiously open the foil packet to allow the steam to escape. Remove the ribs from the foil and set them back on the smoker or grill meat side up. Cover the smoker or grill and allow the ribs to cook until tender but not falling off the bone, about 20 minutes. We prefer to use the &quot;bend test.&quot; Use tongs to pick up one end of the slab of ribs, then bend them slightly. If they are ready, the slab with bow until the meat starts to crack on the surface.

When they are ready, brush sauce on both sides of the ribs and turn them meat side up on the smoker or grill. Cover the smoker or grill and cook until the sauce sets and becomes tacky, 3 to 4 minutes.

Serve. Remove the ribs from the smoker or grill, and slice. For competition, set 4 to 5 ribs side-by-side in the turn in box and top with another 4 to 5 ribs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jHlnHVtXTuA

Competition Rib Recipe - How we cooked out competition ribs at Memphis In May  

#competitionribs #memphisinmay #howtobbqright

Competition Rib Recipe at Memphis In May BBQ Fest

Memphis in May is largest Pork cooking contest on the planet!  Every May thousands of attendees gather on the banks of the Mississippi River to witness the “Super Bowl of Swine”. 

This year my team, The Killer Hogs, entered the Rib category at MIM and we shot a video of our rib recipe while we were there.  

At Memphis in May we face three rounds of judging - if you make it that far - so we cook plenty of ribs.  This year I brought 24 racks just for the contest, plus another 15 just to practice.   That’s a lot of ribs in my book! You can bet it takes a full team effort to tackle MIM and we even bring in extra help - shout out to Mark Williams from Swine Life http://swinelifebbq.com/ (you’ll see him in the video) and to everyone else that helped pull it off.  

On Friday, the day before the actual contest, Mark and I ran a full blown contest recipe.  We prepped and seasoned 15 racks of baby back ribs and fired up Jolene for her first ever Memphis in May smoke.  

She dialed right in at 275, and we fed her a stick of hickory every 45 minutes throughout the cook. Our rib process is fairly quick.  

Each rack gets slathered with a touch of mustard to bind the seasonings; then we layer on Swine Life Mississippi Grind http://bit.ly/SwineLifeMissGrind and Killer Hogs Hot Rub  http://bit.ly/TheHotRub on the back - and Swine Life Mississippi Grind  and Killer Hogs The BBQ Rub http://bit.ly/TheBBQRub on top.  This combo produces a sweet and savory rib with a beautiful mahogany bark.  The  ribs are placed on the pit and spritzed with water every 30-45 minutes to keep them from drying out.

After two hours in the smoke we wrap the ribs with brown sugar, Parkay margarine, Kosmo's Cherry Apple Habanero http://bit.ly/KosmosCAHGlaze , Killer Hogs Vinegar Sauce http://bit.ly/TheVinegarSauce.  

They go back on the pit for 1 hour or until a probe thermometer reads 204 degrees in between the bones.  At this point we rest the ribs in a dry cooler to stop the cooking process and allow time for moisture to reabsorb into the meat.  

To finish the ribs off we take them out of the foil and place on aluminum foil boats for easy transfer.  They get a final dusting of Killer Hogs The BBQ Rub http://bit.ly/TheBBQRub to pretty up the tops and a glaze of sauce.  

The final glaze is a combo of 18oz Killer Hogs The BBQ Sauce http://bit.ly/TheBBQSauce, 9oz Killer Hogs Vinegar Sauce http://bit.ly/TheVinegarSauce, and 2oz TX Pepper Jelly Rib Candy. Heat the glaze a little just so it’s not cool and brush it over each rack. Return the ribs to the smoker for 20-30 minutes to set the glaze.

At this point the ribs are ready to be judged.  For the blind round we cut them into 2 bone segments so the judges can pull the bones apart to check for tenderness. At Memphis in May no garnish is allowed so the only thing in the box is ribs.  

The next round is on site judging where 3 judges come at separate times.  We get to set down with each for 15 minutes and convince them face to face why our ribs are better than the next team.  It’s a daunting challenge but man it’s fun!!  If you’re lucky enough to make it out in the top three of these rounds then you have to do it all again in a final round where the top 3 ribs face off against the best 3 hogs and shoulders.  

We didn’t finish as well as we hoped - 33rd in ribs, but man we sure had a good time and met a lot of new friends. There’s always next year ,and you can bet that the Killer Hogs will be back trying to walk across that stage!  

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For Malcom's BBQ Supplies visit - https://h2qshop.com/

Memphis In May Rib Recipe  - Competition Rib Recipe

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