BBQ Ribs, Buttermilk Coleslaw, Lemon Potato Salad with Herbs

July 4, 2007 at the casa de Abramson. The guest for the day.... the Schachters.

The weather outside was grey, certainly not a beach day. The Schachters were scheduled to arrive at 4:30. With a full day ahead, with no particular plans, I decided to make a time consuming meal. At first I was planning to recreate the July 4th menu from Bon Appetite. Tracy was not in the mood for the different types of burgers planned. So... she flipped through some books and she decided on ribs. Little did she know that proper bbq ribs take hours...

Anyway, Bella's and I went off to North Shore Farms to pick up the ingredients. 5 pounds of spareribs, ground sirloin for burgers (for the kids and in case ribs to not appeal) and the ingredients for the rest of the menu.

The recipe for BBQ ribs came from the Cook's Illustrated Family Cookbook. Incidentally, this book is definitely my most used cookbook in my collection. Thanks to mom for the gift.

For the ribs, I started with a rub, which contained, among other things, chili powder, salt, pepper brown sugar and a few other secret ingredients. The ribs marinated in the rub for an hour. While the ribs were marinating, I soaked some wood chips. After an hour, I placed the ribs on the Weber for a total of three and a half hours, rotating the ribs every half hour. After each hour I added 8 briquettes of charcoal. At the 3:15 mark, I added a Texas BBQ sauce that I made from a recipe from the same cookbook. After the ribs finished cooking on the BBQ, I allowed them to rest for an hour. The results... simply amazing. The spareribs fell off the bone. The ribs had brown char and a smoky flavor.

The sauce was easy to make... just combine ketchup, brown sugar, molasses and a few other ingredients and simmer for 25 minutes. Thereafter, I allowed it to cool for an hour.

As an appetizer, I made two different cream cheese dips, both from Cook's Illustrated. One was made with cilantro, lime juice and chipotles, the other with sun dried tomatoes and Romano. Unfortunately, no one ate either one. I thought both were very good.

For the coleslaw, I combined a the recipe for coleslaw from the current Bon Appetite issue. I first chopped green and red cabbage and allowed it to soak with a tablespoon of salt for an hour. I then added fresh corn, that I boiled for 5 minutes, with cilantro, buttermilk, rice wine vinegar, onion and a few other ingredients. The slaw was great. It had that great balance of sweet and sour.

For the potato salad, I combined red potatoes with low fat mayo, low fat sour cream, lemon zest, cider vinegar, dill, cilantro and a few other things. Again, very very good.