BBQ Chicken and Ribs with Beer BBQ Sauce

A Wicked Summer BBQ with Smoked  Babyback Ribs, Wings & Sauce

For most of you in A Wicked Scoff's reading audience, summer is upon us. To my friends, relatives and fellow Newfoundlander's at home, please accept my apologies as I know you are having a dreadful start to the summer season. Of all the things I miss about Newfoundland, June's capelin weather, which consists of day after day of rain, drizzle, fog and temperature hovering around the 10 degree mark (Celsius), is certainly not one of them. According to the forecast however, things are looking up. With warm sunny days come eating and cooking outside and firing up the grill. When it comes time to serving up your favorite grilled meats, whether it be chicken or pork, don;t reach for some store bought BBQ sauce. Instead whip up a batch of homemade sauce, featuring a healthy portion of your favorite beer. Keeping in line with my Newfoundland heritage this recipe calls for an ample amount of fancy molasses, and some of our own Jockey Club beer. You can use whatever beer you like however.

Last weekend was Father's Day and I used my BBQ Sauce on some grilled chicken wings and smoked baby back ribs. Here are a few pictures from the feast along with a recipe for my sauce, which gets basted on the meats for the final 5-6 minutes of cooking. I also like to serve it table side for dipping. I'll let you know how I prepared my ribs, along with a special BBQ dry rub later this week.

Jockey Club BBQ Sauce

Ingredients:

Babyback ribs about to receive a smothering of BBQ sauce

• 1 small onion, minced
• 2 Tbsp Canola Oil
• 2 cups ketchup
• 1 cup apple cider vinegar
• 1 cup fancy molasses
• 1 cup of Jockey Club (or your favorite beer)
• 1/2 tsp of each of the following: garlic powder, paprika, chili powder, salt and pepper
• 1 tsp allspice

Directions:

Sauced ribs, getting sticky in the final couple of minutes

In a medium sauce pan, saute the onions in the oil over a medium heat until tender and translucent, but not browned. Add all the remaining ingredients, stir well and bring to a simmer. Reduce heat to low and continue to simmer for about 30 minutes until sauce thickens a little. Apply to your favorite grilled meats for the final few minutes of cooking for a sweet, tangy and sticky BBQ sauce coating. I like to keep the sauce pan next to the grill and keep the sauce warm. Serve on the side as well for extra dipping. Goes great with pork chops, ribs and chicken!

Brined/Grilled Pork Chop with Grilled Onions and Spicy BBQ Sauce

Chowing down on grilled pork chops with a sticky, finger-lickin BBQ sauce is one of the finest things about summer. Growing up in out around the bay in rural Newfoundland, having a BBQ, 90 percent of the time meant having grilled pork chops covered in Kraft BBQ sauce. There was nothing fancy about them, they were usually a  frozen variety pack of chop cuts, quite often a fairly thin bone-in sirloin. Donlt get me wrong, I still love those chops, but now when I go to relive my youthful memories of BBQ pork chops, I go at it a little differently.

First of all, my preferred cut of chop is a thick-cut rib chop. This is similar to the pork line chop but has a little T-Bone in it and contains mostly center loin along with a bit of tenderloin...just line a T-Bone steak would. This is a lean cut of pork, so that' why I like to go thick, it won;t dry out as easy. A key is to not cook it to death. Pink in the center with clear juices or 160 degrees is as far as you want to take these puppies. An instant read thermometer will be your best friend.

Another way to insert flavor, seasoning and juiciness through the meat is to brine it. A simple saline solution bath of water, salt and a little apple cider and apple cider vinegar for a few hours will do the trick. Other ways to enhance the seasoning will be to give the chops a dusting with a spice rub before putting on the grill.

The last key to a better chop is to slather it with a homemade BBQ sauce. I mix up the ingredient combination of my BBQ sauces all the time, but they always start out with ketchup, apple cider vinegar, molasses and dry mustard. I usually also add some of whatever dry rub I am using and varying degrees of sweet, sour, savory and heat.

Brined and Grilled Rib-Chops

Ingredients:

4, 8-10 ounce, thick cut rib or center cut pork chops

1 qt of water
1/4 cup of salt
1/4 cup of apple cider (or apple juice)
1 TBSP Worcestershire sauce
2 TBSP of dry rub


Directions:

Mix the wet ingredients to dissolve the salt. Place pork chops in a large ziplock bag, pour in the brine, and let the pork chops swim in the brine for at least 4 hours, but 12-24 hours will be best.

When ready to cook, preheat a gas or charcoal grill and oil the cooking surface with vegetable oil. Pat the chops dry with paper towels and season with a little of the dry rub. Place chops at an angle on the grill so you can give them a quarter turn to get those nice chop house grill marks. I'm not great with cooking times. I go by feel and eye mostly, and I use an instant read thermometer when I am unsure. You'll want to cook the chops to slightly pink, with clear juices. An overcooked pork chop will be tough. The brine process will give you a little forgiveness. For chops of this size I would cook them for about 12-14 minutes and a 5 minute rest time on a warm, covered plate. So, after 3 minutes I would turn for grill marks, at 6 minutes I would flip, at 9 minutes I would quarter turn, apply a brushing of BBQ sauce and at 12 minutes I would  re-flip to apply sauce to side A, and remove from the grill to let rest.

Pork Dry Rub

Ingredients:

1/2 cup of kosher salt
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 TBSP of each of the following:
- garlic powder
- onion powder
- paprika
- chili powder
- allspice
- black pepper
- dry mustard
1 tsp of cayenne pepper

Directions:
Combine salt, sugar and spices well, and store in an air tight container in a cool dry place. Will last for ages.

Pork Chop BBQ Sauce

Ingredients:
2 Cups ketchup
1/2 cup apple cider vinegar
1/2 cup molasses
1 tsp dry mustard
2 TBSP dry rub spice
1 TBSP allspice
dash of Tabasco sauce


Directions:

Combine all ingredients in a small sauce pan. Cook over a medium heat and whisk together. Bring to a simmer, and reduce to low. Cook for 10-15 minutes and reserve for chops and onions. Store in the refrigerator after use.

Grilled Onions

Ingredients:

1-2 Large Vidalia, or other sweet onion, sliced into rounds
Vegetable Oil
Dry Rub Spice
BBQ Sauce

Directions:

Keep the onion slices together (i.e. do not separate as if making onion rings) and coat with a little oil and season with the dry rub spice. Place on a hot grill. Cook for 3-4 minutes until they begin to char and carefully turn with a spatula. Cook until limp and brush with BBQ sauce. Turn again and brush the other side with BBQ sauce. Serve while hot along side grilled pork chops.

Pulled Pork Sandwiches...Satisfaction at its finest!

I really enjoy pork...the other white meat as they say. As Homer Simpson would say..."yes Lisa, a magical animal". Growing up in rural Newfoundland pork was an easy and inexpensive option for meals. In Newfoundland pork chops more often than not are the choice for barbecuing (grilling), ham is a staple, and pork roasts are a common meal. For me personally, I was fortunate to enjoy a "cooked dinner" every Sunday, which consisted of Jigs Dinner (salt meat, carrots, rutabaga, cabbage and potato, and usually a peas pudding) plus more meat, either a stuffed chicken, a pot roast, or a pork roast...each with a delicious gravy to smother the works in. While I'll talk more about all those other foods in future blogs, right now I want to focus on the pork roast.

The most common choice for a pork roast, is a bone-in butt roast (actually from the front end of the pig, not the ...well you know). This cut is a bit fatty, but with that you get awesome flavour. You also get a cut of meat that can be slow cooked (very hard to overcook) so it becomes fall off the bone tender and very juicy. With Jigs Dinner, the only way I ever had a pork roast was cooked for 3 hours at 350 with salt, pepper and onion. As it turns out, the pork roast is common in many cuisines, and one of the most popular is in southern US BBQ, and more specifically "pulled pork". While the most authentic pulled pork is cooked long and slow in a smoker, my recipe for the home cook is cooked long and slow in either a slow cooker or low oven. I add a homemade dry rub and serve it with a kicker of a sauce.

Basic Dry Rub

1/2 cup kosher Salt
1/4 brown sugar
1 Tbsp each of chili powder, paprika, garlic powder, onion powder
1 tsp each of black pepper, cayenne pepper, ancho chili powder, dry mustard
mix well, and store in an air tight jar

Eastern North Carolina BBQ Sauce

This BBQ sauce may be like no other BBQ sauce you've ever had. It's "watery" instead of "ketchupy" and is best applied just before each bite you take of the pork or the sandwich. This is my adaptation on a recipe a friend of mine gave me. His girlfriend is from South Carolina so it;s pretty authentic.

Fill a mason jar with

1 Cup apple cider vinegar
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tsp red pepper flakes (more if you like it hotter)
2 Tbsp brown sugar
1 Tbsp ketchup
1 Tbsp Hot Sauce (Frank's) or less of Tabasco
a couple shakes of Worcestershire Sauce
Shake well

Pulled Pork

Preheat oven to 300 or use a slow cooker
Use a 5-6 pound butt (bone in) pork roast, as you will want leftovers. This will feed a crowd.
Rub the entire roast with enough of the dry rub to completely cover.
Add seasoned roast, to a roasting pan, add a splash of water, apple juice or beer, and cover.
Cook for six hours, or at least until bone can be pulled free with no resistance.

Remove from oven and let rest, covered for 15 minutes.
Using two forks, shred the meat (I also encourage you to taste juicy morsels)

Select good roll for your sandwiches, and toast/broil them to add a little crunch.

Pile the rolls high with pork, add a little sauce, top with the roll. Keep some of the sweet/sour and hot BBQ sauce handy and spoon or squirt some before each bite. You will not be disappointed. I like to serve this with a good coleslaw and a glass of iced tea.

Enjoy.