How many times have I gone shopping and just threw something in my basket for absolutely no reason at all. Sigh. Of course, eventually you must go home, unload your groceries, and stare at that randomly chosen item, and wonder why you bought it. Buyer’s remorse rears its ugly head. Such was the situation with a recent purchase; a rack of St Louis Style Ribs(aka Spareribs), a cut from the lower portion of the of the pig. I cleaned the ribs up a bit, removing the rear membrane, the meat flap(Da Boyz lucked out on this one), though I left the rib tips on. Though I really didn’t do a very detailed job like this. And in the end, I still didn’t know what the heck I was going to do with these. No smoker at my disposal, and I really wanted to do something "Asian".
So this is what I came up with:
It’s sort of Char Siu-ish, except I used whatever I had on hand(sorry no red bean curd), and I got to play with red food coloring…muah-ha-ha-ha. In retrospect, I could have left the ribs in the oven to caramelize for a few more minutes…..but the smell, oh the smell! You can do without the food coloring…..but there something about the combination of those burnt bits and the red color that sets my stomach off. You may want to bake in foil for several hours before starting the regular cooking to tenderize, but I was too lazy. So here you go…another recipe from you friendly neighborhood hack cook.
Chinese Style Barbecue Ribs
Marinade
1/3 Cup Hoisin
1/3 Cup Light Soy Sauce
2 Tb Sugar
3 Tb Honey
2 Tb Shaoxing Wine
1 Tb Oyster Sauce
1/2 Tsp Five Spice Powder
2 Cloves Garlic finely minced
1/2 Tsp Red Food Coloring(optional)
Finishing Glaze:
3 Tb Honey
1 Tb Water
1 Tb Oyster Sauce
2-3 1/2 Lbs St Louis Style(spareribs) cut into individual ribs
1 – Mix the marinade.
2 – Mix together with ribs in a large ziplock bag
3 – Marinate over night
4 – Preheat oven to 350.
5 – Arrange ribs on a rack above a roasting pan filled halfway with water.
6 – Bake for 40 minutes. Turn ribs and bake for another 30-40 minutes. Baste w
ith remaining marinade after turning. Remember to check your water.
7 – Mix "finishing glaze". I added water because the honey I had was so hard and thick.
8 – Turn oven up to 450. Turn ribs and bake for 10 minutes. Turn ribs and baste with glaze and bake until desired color is achieved (10-15) more minutes.
9 – Remove ribs from oven and baste with glaze one more time.
Serve with rice. It is nice to use the oven, you can have the Big Kahuna reserved for other stuff. In this case, some nice Black Bean Chicken.
And our 30 second green vegetable…that’s all the time it takes on the Big Kahuna. With only salt, slices of garlic, and dried shrimp. High heat does the rest.
