This is in the category of things you didn't know you needed... Chicken fried ribs! How in the world did we find them? Remember Connie's list of the 51 best sandwiches? One is at Fox Brothers BBQ in Atlanta. A couple of years ago we drove through and we had the Fox Brothers Burger - which is really chopped smoked beef brisket - but HAD to try the chicken fried ribs appetizer. This trip, we made sure there was time to head downtown Atlanta and visit Fox Brothers. And, I came away determined to try and make chicken fried ribs. There are two parts to this. One is the ribs themselves and the other is the bbq sauce. It's Alabama white BBQ sauce. Something I've never made. Now, I have a pretty darned good taste memory so I thought I could recreate it once I surfed the web and checked out how others prepared it. Some put in massive quantities of vinegar, some a smidgen. Some used smoked paprika. Most used horseradish and garlic. I started by dolloping some mayonnaise in a plastic storage container - probably a cup and a half. Tossed in a couple of teaspoons of horseradish followed by an equal amount of crushed garlic. Then, I poured in a couple of tablespoons of cider vinegar. And, I went hunting for the smoked paprika. I know it's on the second shelf. But, it was buried. Out came the juniper berries, then the curry. As I had my hand on the next item I looked to the right and saw Penzey's BBQ 3000. Ah HA! That would not only have smoked paprika but also some other good stuff. It'd do just fine. In went about a tablespoon of the BBQ 3000. The sauce was too thick so another tablespoon of vinegar went in. Stir, taste, we have a winner! You all like my fancy bowl? LOL Hey, at least I didn't use a plastic spoon!
Next it was time to figure out the ribs. Connie'd run errands most of the morning and came home to smoke the ribs while I stayed at the office and plowed through a bunch of work. I'd gotten home to a lovely smoked rack of ribs. He said he kept them at about 250 for a couple of hours.
After looking at the few chicken fried ribs recipes I could find, I decided to just wing it. I saw ones with panko and ones with corn meal. But, I just didn't think the Fox Brothers ribs had either. So, I went with the flour, egg/milk, seasoned flour dipping routine. I know. You look at that and think, "What a total complete and entire mell of a hess!" And, yes, I closed the drawer before I kept dipping. Connie'd reached in and gotten the candy thermometer to check the temp on the hot oil and he didn't get the drawer totally closed as I took the photo.
The seasoned flour had salt, pepper and more of the BBQ 3000.
I heated up a couple of inches of vegetable oil in a deep saucepan and started dipping the ribs. Three at a time could be fried so I was pretty glad we'd done just one rack!
The first batch came out and I realized they were craggier than the ones we'd had at Fox Brothers. But, they were still good!
Connie said he'd like mac and cheese with the ribs. I was thinking the tomato pie with pimento cheese topping that I'd read on the New York Times site. So, I compromised. Pimento cheese mac and cheese it was. And, sliced tomatoes with basil and balsamic glaze on the side. Made me very happy that I'd spent $3.99 a pound for half a pound of heirloom tomatoes! They were fabulous. The mac and cheese was a basic cheddar mac and cheese with 2 oz of diced pimentos and about 20 shakes of chipotle Tabasco sauce added. I used 3T of both butter and flour and about 2 1/2 cups of 2% milk. Then, stirred in about 8oz of shredded Cracker Barrel extra sharp cheddar.
So there you have it. What you didn't know you needed! Here's how it looked all put together.
I'm the sauce girl. Salad dressing, gravy, barbecue sauce. You name it. I love it. So, for me to eat ribs without barbecue sauce you have to be talking about some seriously good ribs. I ate these with NO sauce.
A few weeks ago I dredged three cookbooks out of the bargain bin at the grocery store. They sell closeouts at wonderfully low prices. This cookbook I bought because of a recipe called Hoosier Lamb Chops. As I browsed through it I found loads of recipes I'd like to try. Ribs sounded good. Tuscan Ribs sounded fabulous. And, I thought it'd be a great weekend meal. Make the rub and slather them on Saturday. Smoke them on Sunday. Well, no, the recipe didn't call for smoking the ribs. But,we love to smoke just about anything on our grill.
We made these a couple of weeks ago and absolutely devoured them. And, cut the other racks into serving size pieces and froze them. For evenings when we get home too late and don't want to cook. Tonight was one of those nights. We pulled around the corner to our house and both of us went WOW - look at those!
Crocus that were open and stunningly beautiful. And, one little iris:
So, we spent about an hour wandering the yard and chatting about what we'd like to accomplish this year. I wish I'd taken a notebook outside and started a written list of what we need to/want to buy (yeah, that's the financial planner coming out - distinguish between your wants and your needs...) Here are some of the fun things we saw:
The old hellebore (aka lenten rose) has a couple of flowers open. Rather buried int he leaves but open. And, tons of buds. The newbie from last year looks like it's going to do really well.
No signs of asparagus in the garden but the srawberries are coming back nicely. There are a few daffodils on the south wall of the house that are about to bloom. The golden raspberries have loads of buds as does the wisteria. The daylilies all over the yard are just going crazy. As are the surprise lilies. We'll have to divide those this year. And, we really will have to divide our siberian iris. All 25 have now gotten empty spots in their centers. We'll probably have a LOT of those to give away. If you live in this area and would like some starts, please let me know. We've got plenty to share!
Now, it was time to head to the south side of the fence. A total riot of crocus! And, soon to follow, an equal number of daffodils. This year we're hoping to put a path through here and mulch the rest. Too many of our neighbors don't understand the theory that you've got to let the daffodil leaves die down to store nutrients for the next year... With mulch instead of grass we'll not have to worry!
Finally, we were off to the herb garden. The sorrel is starting to come back. The blueberry bushes, small though they may be, are growing. And the lavendar, thyme and marjoram look great. Ok, so they need a bit of trimming. But, to spring-starved eyes, they look fabulous!
Now, did I mention that we're supposed to
get 6-9" of snow tomorrow? LOL. I guess I ignored that. The good news is that snow is an insulator. It's much better for our plants than fifteen degrees. So, we'll enjoy what will hopefully be the last snow of the season and look forward to seeing our flowers again soon.
Now, on to our recipe:
Tuscan Ribs
Ingredients:
2 T olive oil
2 T rosemary, chopped fresh or 1 t dried
1 1/2 T kosher salt
1 1/2 T fennel seeds
2 t freshly ground pepper
2 t fresh chopped sage or 1 t dried
2 t fresh thyme, chopped or 1/2 t dried
2 t paprika
1/2 - 1 t crushed red pepper (how much heat do you like?)
1 t ground coriander
1/2 t ground allspice
6 lbs pork ribs
3 T balsamic glaze
Directions:
Mix all the herbs and spices with the olive oil to make the spice paste. Smear the spice paste over the ribs, cover and refrigerate overnight. The original recipe called for roasting the ribs at 325 for two hours the broiling them for two minutes with the balsamic glaze drizzled over them. Instead, we smoked ours for a couple of hours at about 325. We used cherry wood.
adapted from Fix It and Enjoy It
