Slow Grilled Beef Ribs

To start with light your BBQ and be ready for a cook time of about 6-8 hours. This is easily achieved using good charcoal briquettes, on your gas BBQ or even a wood fire if you are up to the challenge. You could even cook these nice and low in the oven, you would just lose the smokey flavour. You want to cook these beef ribs indirect, meaning they are sat away from the direct source of heat, off to the side and with the BBQ lid down to create convection heat. You should be aiming for a grill temperature in the ‘low an slow’ range of 105c – 135. 

Start by carefully trimming off the top layer of fat and silver skin from the ribs which is on the meat side. It’s only a few mm thick and be careful not to take off any of the meat underneath. Once trimmed, flip the ribs over to the bone side and lightly score through the membrane you’ll see in a 1inch diamond patter. The same as you may for pork crackling. The cover the whole rack with a small amount of olive oil, this is to help the layer of seasoning stick. Take around a tablespoon of the salt and another of the coarse ground black pepper and mix them together. Evenly coat the whole rack of ribs on every side not forgetting the back bone side and the sides of the ribs too. Add some wood chunks or chips to your BBQ and then set the ribs down away from the heat to start cooking. I like to use oak wood myself but you can use whatever hardwood or fruitwood chips/chunks you can buy.

Every hour or so, lift the lid carefully and give them a spritz with a spray bottle just enough to lightly moisten the surface. This will help the smoke to stick and stop them drying out. I used water for this cook but if you want to be more adventurous you can use a 50/50 mix of apple juice and apple cider vinegar, or maybe even some beer.

After around 4-5 hours of cooking the beef ribs should be ready to wrap. If you have a temperature probe you can check and should be reading a temperature of 60-70c. If you don’t have a probe then it’s not to worry. If they are in a BBQ with smoking wood the outside will have started to darken down a little, the fat should be starting to melt and then will feel semi tender to the touch. They will still be a little too firm to eat and so they need to carry on cooking. Before you put the ribs back on the grill spritz them well one last time and then wrap them up as tightly as you can in either a double layer of tin foil or some unwaxed butchers paper. This will help to speed up the final part of the cook and help them tenderise even more. Top up your BBQ fuel as needed and add the beef ribs back to the heat.

At around the 6-7 hour mark you can start testing for tenderness, again using your meat probe if you have one and you should be reading a final finishing temperature of 90-95c. If you don’t have a probe you can check for tenderness with a toothpick, it should go into the ribs with very little resistance, as if you were pushing it into some warm butter. Check the ribs in multiple places as some areas are thicker than others and will become tender at different times.

Whilst the ribs cook for the final stretch you can make your pink pickled onions and here’s how. Slice the red onion fairly thinly and set aside. Add the vinegar, sugar, salt and mustard to a clean preserve jar, screw on the lid and shake well to dissolve the sugar and salt. Add the onion into the jar and give it a good mix. Then pop into the fridge and chill for about an hour before using. The tang from these onions works so well to cut through the fatty and beefy flavours from the ribs.

When the ribs are done meaning nice and tender all over, open up a small section of the foil or butcher paper to let out the steam for around 10-15 minutes. Then this is the hardest part, you really need to let the meat rest, ideally for 30 minutes just out on the side still wrapped or even better still in their foil/paper but wrapped in an old towel for around an hour.

Once ready, remove the full rack and slice and serve with your favourite BBQ sides, we went for pickled pink onions and some jalapeno cornbread with these.

Sit back and watch your guests be wowed.