Here in the Chicago suburbs, the weather today was perfect for grilling: 72 F with a light breeze and blue skies. It was a perfect day to smoke a rack of ribs for Father's Day weekend.
I purchased a full pork spare rib. I elected not to trim it down to St Louis style. I dried the surface, applied a thin layer of mustard as a binder and then applied three layers of dry rub. Then it went into the fridge last night.
Here are the ribs ready for smoking. The yellow color of the mustard dominates.
I pulled the meat out of the fridge about 1 1/2 hours before grill time to allow it to come up closer to room temp. I planned to follow the 3-2-1 process.
The Ironwood 885 was charged with Bear Mountain Gourmet BBQ blend pellets. I put the ribs on the grill as soon as I ignited the pellets to allow the meat to receive the initial burst of smoke during the startup process. The grill temp was set to 225 F.
My goal was to reach an internal temp of 155 F in about three hours. However, because these were full spare ribs, including the tips, it took a few minutes longer. I pulled them off the grill for wrapping after about 3 hours 15 minutes. Here are the ribs just before wrapping. They are starting to look pretty good. The bark is not heavy as I only applied thin layers of dry rub.
After two hours of braising in sealed foil, the internal temperature had reached 187 F. Here is the result. They are ready for sauce. At this point, I noted that the earlier portions of the cook had been done with the bones up rather than down. LI will fix that next time.
The ribs continued to cook to a temp of 195 F for another hour. I basted them every 15 minutes with a combination of BBQ sauces and the juices from the braising. The ribs rested in foil for 1/2 hour before dinner. The final result.
This was my first attempt ever at cooking ribs, so I was pleased with the results. The ribs were not quite "fall off the bone", but they were tender and tasty. So it was another cook in the winner column.