Smoked Baby Back Ribs with Apple Butter

The weekends before Thanksgiving are a good time to give the holiday menu a trial run outdoors. Smoked Baby Back Ribs with Apple Butter brings slow-cooked pork and concentrated fruit sweetness to a fall cookout. Serve a rack alongside the sides you’re considering for the big day, or slice it into individual bones for guests to pass around while dinner comes together.

Scott Thomas of The Grillin' Fools uses the Ovation Hybrid Grill as a smoker, letting the seasoned racks smoke for three hours before wrapping them in butcher paper. The apple butter goes inside that wrap, where it stays against the meat during the final hour of cooking. That timing gives the pork a chance to develop its barbecue flavor before the fruit comes into play. We're glad to share Scott's take on a familiar cut, especially how he uses a single seasonal ingredient to change the character of the finished ribs.

At American Made Grills, we build some of the best grills made in the USA, with handcrafted construction and the versatility to handle a full outdoor menu. The Ovation runs on gas, charcoal, or hardwood so that a slow smoke can be as much a part of your fall routine as a quick dinner over the flame.

For a pre-holiday supper, pair the ribs with roasted squash and a crisp cabbage slaw. The squash echoes the pork's mellow sweetness, while the slaw adds crunch and a little acidity. Set the platter in the middle of the table and let everyone help themselves.

Serves 3-5

Smoked Baby Back Ribs with Apple Butter Ingredients

• pink butcher paper
• 2 slabs Baby Back Ribs
• Salt
• BBQ Rub Divided
• 6 pats Butter
• 16 teaspoons Apple butter (Substitute any other fruit butter, pumpkin butter, honey butter, or BBQ sauce)

Smoked Baby Back Ribs with Apple Butter Directions

1. Skin the membrane off the back of each slab of ribs and season the bone side with salt and your favorite BBQ rub. Then flip over and season the meat side with salt and BBQ rub
2. Set up the grill for two-zone grilling, with hot coals and smoke wood on one side and no direct heat on the other. Target temperature inside the grill is 300F (+/-25F). For this grill, fill the right two charcoal trays with charcoal and char logs, then light them. Place a hickory split just off the edge of the hot coals.
3. 
   Once the wood starts smoking and the temp inside the cook chamber is around 300F, place the seasoned ribs off the edge of the hot coals.
4. Close the lid for about an hour, then replace the smoke wood as needed. Also reposition the ribs so the farther slab is closest, and vice versa.
5. After 2 hours, move the ribs if needed and dust them with seasoning. Replace the smoke wood with fresh wood if necessary.
6. After about 3 hours, prepare the pink butcher paper by tearing off a long sheet and slapping down three pats of butter, four heaping teaspoons of apple butter, and a couple of hearty pinches of seasoning. Set a slab of baby back ribs, meat side down, on the apple butter, butter, and seasoning, then place four more teaspoons of apple butter on the bone side of the ribs, using the back of the spoon to spread it evenly. Dust the bone side of the ribs with more seasoning.
7. Repeat with the other slab of ribs, then place both wrapped slabs back on the grill on the indirect side for an hour.
8. Remove the wrapped ribs from the grill and the butcher paper. Carve the ribs into individual bones and transfer to a platter. Drizzle the apple butter slurry from the butcher paper over the carved ribs and dust with more BBQ rub for garnish and an extra blast of flavor.
9. Serve and enjoy.
   

Taken from grillinfools.com