Yep. I have this overly expensive Aussie propane grill I use when I don’t have time to smoke something.
To cook ribs at home, I use the 3-2-1 method in the smoker. I use St Louis cut pork ribs, peel the skin off of the back using a pair of catfish skinning pliers (or you can use a paper towel to get a grip on it), and cover them with my own take on Zensters dry rub mix
I put them in the smoke for 3 hours, temp 225 (maybe a little higher if they are meatier ribs) over applewood smoke. At the 3 hour mark I wrap the ribs in foil and put them back in for 2 hours. At the two hour mark I pull them out and throw them back on the smoke for 1 hour. When the meat starts pulling back from the end of the bone about half an inch or so they are done.
If you say that too loud you’ll lose your barbecue street cred.
I like my hot dogs on the charcoal grill (especially Sahlen’s dogs from Buffalo, used by Ted’s Hot Dogs.) They just don’t taste right without that flame-licked goodness. And I don’t mind them steamed/boiled, either.
I wrote the “what’s a gas grill” partly in jest, but partly because I have a gas grill…somewhere in the garage, I think…that hasn’t gotten used in 10 years. This is not to say that I wouldn’t want to have one of those sexy Weber Genesises, but I haven’t gotten to that point yet.
Heh…I actually learned that from one of the big 'cue message boards. It’s become a pretty common way to do ribs. I do something similar with pulled pork whenever I want some of that foreign 'cue.
Take a Boston butt roast, cover it in yellow mustard, then apply the same rub as the ribs. Throw it in the smoker with a pan of apple juice under it. Fill a spray bottle of apple juice and wet down the pig with it every few hours.
At around 180 degrees you wrap the pig, spray more apple juice on it before you close it up and cook it till 195 or so. Then you put the whole thing in an empty ice chest, fill the ice chest blankets, pillows, whatever you have laying around and close it up for 45 minutes. Unfoil and it pretty much falls apart. Doing one of those tonight (it was on sale). I’ve had it take as much as 16 hours to cook.
That’s pretty much how I do my shoulder, minus the foil and the apple juice (waste of good apple juice, if you ask me.) But I do the mustard, dry rub, and ice chest rest. (Well, usually I do the ice chest rest. Sometimes, I don’t happen to have one around.)
I do sometimes foil a couple of ribs for people who like the softer style of ribs. But if I’m cooking for myself, there’s no foil.
The secret to the ribs is to foil only for those two hours, then to open it back up to the smoke so they firm up a bit and you get a good bark. The texture comes out perfect, IMHO.
I’ve done it with and without the apple juice. The apple juice makes a difference and my wife gripes about it when I blow that part off.
Yeah, they get too soft for my tastes, but, like I said, I do sometimes put some aside for those who like their ribs more fall of the bone than pull of the bone.
Interesting. I can’t taste any difference whatsoever in putting apple juice in the water pan (and these days I prefer not to use a water pan at all, anyway). Now, in the foil is a different story.
Wrapping in foil for two hours really braises the heck out of the ribs. Texturally, it’s the same as boiling, but with a little more flavor. Both are wet methods.
I also agree that any liquid other than water in the pan is pretty much a waste of time. Most of what evaporates out is the water, leaving a concentrated liquid remaining in the pan.
I like to cook on the grill/smoker more often in the summer, firing off the oven in the house for hours in the summer with the AC going full tilt doesn’t do it for me. I absolutely love meat braised in the oven, ox tail for instance, but I make it in the winter. I also grill in the winter, smoke in the winter, Thanksgiving turkey in the smoker, that sort of thing.
I also like roast beef in the oven, roasted chicken in the oven, and even finish off braising a smoked brisket or butt in the oven if it needs a little extra time. It’s all good.
I think the best thing that happened to my outdoor cooking was to get a couple of different cookers. A smoker, a large grill for full on cookouts, and a small grill for frequent use. My most recent grill is a little Weber Smokey Joe. Only takes a handful of charcoal, start the fire and it’s ready to go by the time I get the meat prepped/seasoned. Perfect for 2 steaks or 4 hamburgers or a package of chicken thighs or a 4 pack of pork chops. Maybe not quite as convenient as a gas grill, but I’m used to building charcoal fires and don’t mind doing it.
I want to build a yakitori grill out by the burn pit next year, just fuel it with coals from the fire in the pit.
I guess I just enjoy cooking outside, but not to the point of fanaticism. My oven still gets plenty of use.
As for sides of ribs, a little too far south for the OP, but when we went to the US Grand Prix last year, we swung through Lockhart and hit Smitty’s, Black’s, and Kreuz. Wish I’d had known of Zimmerhanzel, but it was the opposite direction from our hotel. Maybe next time! We got full sides of ribs and brisket from each and had BBQ tasting for the next couple of days. Sure perks up the aroma of the continental breakfast in the hotel in the mornings, people looking under lids for the BBQ.
For all that I’ve been here a few years, all I know about the area comes from the following travelers’ advisory from possibly the 30’s:
If you go down in Deep Ellum,
Put your money in your shoes
'Cause those women in Deep Ellum
Got those Deep Ellum blues
Is it safe now to go down there without getting the business from some flatfoot floozy with the floy-floy?
Ah…a little history then.
Deep Ellum comes from a racial slur – The area was predominantly African-American and Elm street runs right through it. So it was making fun of the way the locals pronounced Elm.
Some time back in the 70’s/80’s a theater geek got a hold of one of the commercial spaces down there (it was a bunch of run down buildings) and Opened up a Theater/art gallery called Theater Gallery. This didn’t make much money until some punk rocker types talked them into letting them put on shows there. That made a lot more money, theater was out, punk rock was in. Other clubs/bars opened and weird little shops, tattoo parlors etc.
The place gentrified pretty quick, with lots of lofts springing up. Most of the clubs now had more main-stream music.
So now, it’s a pretty safe place to go, but more of the buildings are vacant again than when it was in it’s prime.
I didn’t know all that, but I seem to recall that Deep Ellum was also one of the handful of places that got the nickname ‘black bottom’, including neighborhoods in Detroit and Nashville. Also, there was an article in the Observer a couple years ago that suggested that it’s really difficult to get out of the neighborhood when its jumping, and there’s a lot of unwanted groping going on there.
So, this Bakers does the Memphis-style dry rub? Because of course I don’t disdain barbecue sauce, but I have been impressed with what you get when you season your ribs so that you can leave it off. Frankly, I haven’t been impressed with the sauces available at Red Hot & Blue when I’ve sampled them, though their sides are very appealing. But to give you an idea where my own tastes are at, the only store-bought sauce I’ve ever not been disappointed in was Sweet Baby Ray’s. It has that quality I’ve only elsewhere found in those homemade rub recipes that are mostly brown sugar and paprika as a base, with a handful of dry spices – a balance between sweet and spicy that brings both into sharp relief. Sounds exactly like every barbecue sauce is supposed to be, but I actually haven’t found it to be the case most of the time.
Sorry, the internets didn’t notify me about your post.
I don’t like using the phrase memphis style for rubs because Texas is traditionally dry-rub also. Bakers ribs are quite good dry-rub only, and they are served dry with sauce on the side.
For bottled sauces, when I go there, I go with Stubb’s line of sauces. Their dry rub is quite good too (just not as good as my own).
Nobody has ever groped me in Deep Ellum, I guess I go to the wrong places. And yeah, on a busy weekend night the traffic is pretty slow moving, but it’s not that big of an area so it’s not so bad. I took my son to a concert there when he was 16 or so…dropped him off and went and hung out at Cafe Brazil (just down the street) until the show was over. He walked the wrong way coming out o f the club and got lost, but some nice transvestites found him wandering around and gave him a lift to where i was.
I though Texas was just smoked and very, very cooked. 
lol…bbq by nature is very very cooked (and smoked).