delvious

Whether it’s at a classy sit down restaurant or takeout from the little place down the street, I have trouble turning down pork ribs when they’re on the menu.  No matter what I did that day or what I had for breakfast, it’s rare that something could possibly sound more appealing than a falling-off-the-bone rack of ribs dripping with barbecue sauce.

Let me introduce you to these Dr. Pepper Chipotle Ribs.  They captivated me the moment I laid eyes on the recipe.  It’s a tough job I had here, but I had to find out whether they were delicious enough to be called delvious.

Recipe

For the many of you that have never tried making barbecue sauce at home, it’s made up largely of sugar.  As you are probably more aware, soda is primarily sugar – and thereby a stellar ingredient for barbecue sauce (just don’t use diet soda because artificial sweeteners aren’t going to cut it here).  Simmered on the stove with the other ingredients, the Dr. Pepper reduced down to a concentrated sweetness marked by its distinctive flavor.


I kept the chipotle on the lower end of the 2-4 teaspoons suggested by the recipe; I don’t care for the real spicy barbecue that some parts of the country seem to prefer.  I’ve also heard barbecue is more vinegary on the East Coast, so I wasn’t surprised by the addition of some apple cider vinegar to my Dr. Pepper adaptation.  I certainly didn’t mind that, I’ve been know to eat salt & vinegar chips by the (5 serving size) bag.


Monitoring these ribs in the oven for 2.5 hours is a time commitment.  Don’t worry though, you will be greatly rewarded for your patience.  Layering flavor with both a rub and sauce (especially with that final few minutes under the broiler to caramelize and crisp up the surface) resulted in addicting complexity.  I see no reason to limit this sauce to ribs;  I suspect it would make an outta-this-world condiment on a bacon cheeseburger.

Dr. Pepper Chipotle Spare Ribs

Adapted from Homesick Texan

Prep time + Wait time + Cook time = 30 min + 4 hr + 2 hr 40 min

Printable recipe

Rib Ingredients

1/4 cup salt

1/4 cup black pepper

1/4 cup brown sugar

4 tsp mustard powder

1/2 tsp cayenne

2 tsp chipotle powder

1/2 tsp allspice

2 racks St. Louis style ribs

1/4 cup Dr. Pepper

Sauce Ingredients

2 cups Dr. Pepper

1 cup ketchup

1/2 cup yellow mustard

1/4 cup apple cider vinegar

2 tbsp molasses

2-4 tsp chipotle powder

Directions

1.  Mix dry spices for the rib rub together.  Coat the ribs with the rub, wrap in plastic and refrigerate for at least 4 hours.  (Omit the salt if you are planning to marinate longer.)

2.  Preheat oven to 300F and bring the ribs to room temperature.  Line a baking or roasting pan with foil and place ribs in with the meat side up.  Add the 1/4 cup of Dr. Pepper.  Cover tightly with foil and place in the oven.

3. Add the sauce ingredients to a large saucepan over medium-high heat.  Bring to a boil and reduce to a simmer for 20 minutes until thick and syrupy.

4.  After an hour and a half, remove the ribs from the oven and spread some of the sauce on each side. Place back in the oven, meat side up, and cook uncovered for 30 minutes.

5.  Take the ribs out and spread more sauce on them.  Cook bone side up and uncovered for another 30 more minutes or until ribs have reached the desired tenderness.

6.  Remove the ribs from the oven, and spread the remaining sauce on them.  Cook each side under the oven broiler for 4 minutes.

Spare Ribs Cooking Tips

Completely new to making my very own rack of ribs, I didn’t prepare adequately for handling this giant hunk of meat.  Once the ribs were already in the oven baking away, I decided to Google some tips on cooking spare ribs only to learn I had made several mistakes.

• Cut of meat: Unable to find 2 racks of “St. Louis ribs” at the grocery, I settled for 1 large rack of spare ribs.  I should have at least trimmed them of excess fat; while still tasty, my ribs came out far too fatty for my liking.
• Marinating vs. curing: Par for my overambitious cooking plans, the rub-marinated ribs ended up in the fridge for 48 hours before they went into the oven.  Evidently, salt starts curing pork after about 4 hours.  I definitely detected some ham/bacon flavor in my ribs (not a bad thing necessarily, but not what I was going for).  So if you’re planning to let your ribs marinate overnight, omit the salt from the rub until you are ready to cook.

Nonetheless, I would like to reiterate that it’s okay to deviate from recipes!  Even though my ribs probably tasted somewhat different from the original recipe, we had no trouble polishing them off.

10 Comments | In: Pork | tags: barbecue sauce, chipotle, Dr. Pepper, dry rub, spare ribs. | #

I came across this idea for white chocolate covered grapes and decided to try it out for a delvious variation of the Valentine’s Day standard.  With melted chocolate on hand, however, I couldn’t resist getting a few strawberries in there too.

Recipe

Chocolate covered fruit (or anything – pretzels, potato chips…) is deceptively easy to put together with beautiful results.  Here’s the quick rundown on making it happen:

Chocolate Covered Grapes and Strawberries

1.  Wash fruit and dry thoroughly with a paper towel.  Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

2.  Melt chocolate of your choice (I used some semi-sweet, milk and white) in a double boiler or 30 seconds at a time in the microwave.

3. Dip fruit in the melted chocolate, allowing excess to drip off.  If desired, roll in finely chopped nuts (I used macadamias).

4.  Place on prepared baking sheet.  Use a fork dipped in chocolate to drizzle decoratively over the top if wanted.  Refrigerate for an hour or until hardened.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

No Comments | In: Dessert, Fruit | tags: chocolate, grapes, macadamia nuts, strawberry. | #

A long time ago, some show on the Food Network informed me that apple pie is sometimes served under a slice of melted cheddar cheese.  It’s hard to beat melted cheddar cheese.  It gives that extra oomph to mac & cheese, cheeseburgers, gooey nachos, scrambled eggs.  I could keep going with this list, but I’ll stop here – note, however, that none of these are desserts.  I’ve since been curious to try this cheddar apple dessert combo to determine once and for all whether à la fromage is possibly as good as à la mode.

Recipe

Rather than bothering with pie crust, I found a recipe for an apple cobbler topped with buttermilk cheddar biscuits in lieu of more traditional sweet biscuit dough.  I picked up some Granny Smith and Golden Delicious apples after referencing this handy dandy Real Simple apple chart;  both of these varieties can hold up their texture and flavor when baked.





The recipe was relatively simple to make, and it was obvious that the baked apples and the cheddar biscuits would be delicious separately.  As it turned out, they were delicious together as well; once my little ramekins came out of the oven, the cheddar had melted and browned for a delvious twist on salty-sweet with the sugary cinnamon apple filling.


Reluctant to give up ice cream on a fresh-out-of-the-oven cobbler, I dolloped a scoop of vanilla on my serving, took a bite…and did not care for it.  I think the ice cream masked the subtle flavor of the cheddar.  I eat basically anything à la mode (yes, I think pudding with ice cream is quite enjoyable), so foregoing ice cream on a dessert is rare for me.

Apple Cheddar Cobbler

Adapted from honey & jam

Prep time + Cook time = 30 minutes + 1 hour

Serves 10

Printable recipe

Fruit Filling Ingredients

1 tbsp room temperature unsalted butter (for dish)
1 cup packed medium brown sugar
3 tbsp cornstarch
1/2 tsp fine sea salt
1 tsp ground cinnamon
8 large apples, peeled, cored, and sliced 1/4 inch thick (3 1/2 pounds prepped)
Juice of 1 lemon
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) unsalted butter

Biscuit Ingredients

2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tbsp sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp fine sea salt
2 cups (4 oz) grated extra-sharp cheddar cheese
1 1/3 cups cold buttermilk, plus more if needed

Directions

1.  Position rack in the lower third of the oven.  Preheat to 375F.  Grease a 9 x 9 baking dish (or 10 ramekins) with the softened tablespoon of butter.

2.  Combine the brown sugar, cornstarch, salt and cinnamon in a large bowl.  Add the apple slices and toss to evenly coat with a large spoon or your hands.  Gently stir in the lemon juice and allow the apples to sit for 15 minutes to release some juice.

3.  Mix the apple mixture well, and pour it into the prepared baking dish.  Cube the 1/4 cup of butter and scatter over the apple filling in the dish.  Cover with foil, and bake for 20 minutes.

4.  Meanwhile, make the biscuit dough.  Whisk the flour, 1 tablespoon of the sugar, baking powder and salt in a medium bowl.  Add the cheese to the dry ingredients, and toss to coat evenly.  Make a well in the center of the bowl, and add the buttermilk.  Using a rubber spatula or your hands, stir until just moistened.  The dough should be shaggy and moist; if it seems too dry, add buttermilk 1 tablespoon at a time.

5.  Remove the baking dish from the oven and discard the foil.  In 1/4 cup portions, place the dough evenly atop the apple filling.  You will end up with about 9 biscuits for a 9 x 9 baking dish  (or 1 for each of 10 ramekins).  Sprinkle the remaining tablespoon of sugar over the biscuits.

6.  Return the uncovered cobbler to the oven.  Bake for about 40 minutes (30 minutes for ramekins), until the apples are tender and the biscuits are golden brown.  This tastes best the day it is made, but wrapped leftovers will keep at room temperature for 2 to 3 days.

Comparing Baked Fruit Desserts

A cobbler is one of my favorite types of dessert, but I also love crisps and crumbles.  These baked fruit desserts are always tasty, but I had no idea how to classify the different types.  Here’s a helpful tutorial from The Kitchn:

• Crumble – Fruit baked with a streusel-like topping.   Streusel is usually a mixture of oatmeal, brown sugar, butter and spices such as cinnamon.
• Crisp - A crisp is similar to a crumble, but there are no oats in the topping.  This makes it more like a cookie or pie crust.
• Cobbler - Fruit baked with a biscuit topping.
• Grunt - Similar to a cobbler, but cooked entirely on the stove top.  After the fruit is stewed and broken down, the biscuit dough is added on top and the pot is covered to let the biscuits steam.
• Buckle - While baking, fruit sinks to the bottom as a cake batter rises around the it.
• Pandowdy - Fruit covered with a pie crust.  After coming out of the oven, the pie crust is broken into big pieces.

3 Comments | In: Dessert, Fruit | tags: Apples, biscuits, Cheddar cheese, cobbler, Golden Delicious, Granny Smith. | #