Decided to smoke some St. Louis ribs that I bought at Aldi’s on my Recteq pellet smoker. I trimmed some of the fat off of the meat, removed the membrane from the back, and coated in olive oil and Kansas City Cowtown The Squeal Hog Rub. The Squeal is my favorite rub for pork. As you can see, I don’t overdo it on the rub, because I like the taste of the meat and don’t want to drown it out with too much rub.
I heated up the smoker to 250 degrees and put the ribs on around 12:45. Sometimes I smoke them at 225, but I wanted to make sure they were done by dinner time. I used to wrap them in foil via the 2-2-1 method, but my personal preference is to not have the ribs fall off the bone, and I find that they turn out more flavorful if you don’t wrap them. So this was a straight cook with no wrapping. After a few hours, here is how they looked….
Cooking at 250 degrees, these ribs took a full six hours to get up to 205 degrees and ready for pulling. Here’s what they looked like when finished.
I pulled them and cut them. They had a nice smoke ring…
They were tender and flavorful, but pretty fatty, even though I trimmed a lot of the fat off before cooking. I think I’ll go with the baby back ribs next time, but this was still a successful cook!