Thanks to Stubb’s Legendary Bar-B-Q for sponsoring this post. As always, all opinions are 100% my own.

Meaty pork ribs are rubbed with a tangy mix of spices, chile peppers and lime juice and smoked low and slow until tender.

We recently bought a kit to convert our charcoal grill into a smoker. It has been a fun weekend project to pick out beautiful pieces of meat from the Farmer’s Market and let ’em cook alllllll day.

This Pork Spice Rub from Stubb’s is ridiculously tasty. As soon as I opened the jar to take a whiff, I was in love. It packs a bit of heat, but it’s not overpowering at all.

And I love that the only prep that the pork takes is to shake on a nice coating of the rub, rub it in and let it chill in the fridge for a while.

Easy peasy!

Once the ribs sat for a while, my husband prepped the smoker. This was only our second time using it, and we haven’t totally nailed down the timing and temperature regulation yet, but we’re getting there!

One recommendation I have is to make sure you have a reliable way to monitor the temperature of the smoker and the meat. We picked up a dual probe wireless style meat thermometer.

You don’t want to have to take the lid off the top to check your meat temperature while it’s cooking, or you’ll lose all of the heat you’ve built up under the dome. So this is pretty key. There are lots of different types available – there’s a great article over on Amazing Ribs to help guide you.

To go alongside these ribs, I took inspiration from my local Farmer’s Market. I picked up a bright, colorful mix of veggies from a few different vendors and sautéed them all together to make a summery medley. I also picked up a freshly baked loaf of focaccia to round out the meal.

The ribs tasted awesome. We haven’t been able to get our smoking times down quite right yet, so they weren’t as tender as we would have liked them to be. But hey… we’ll just have to practice a few more times to get into the swing of things.

I ended up pouring myself a little pile of BBQ sauce on the side to dip each bite of meat into – delicious!

Spice Rubbed Smoked Country Style Ribs with Farm Fresh Veggie Sauté

Description

Meaty pork ribs are rubbed with a tangy mix of spices, chile peppers and lime juice and smoked low and slow until tender.

Scale

Ingredients

For Ribs:

3–4 pounds country style pork ribs
Stubb’s Pork Spice Rub
Stubb’s Legendary Bar-B-Q Sauce (We used Original), for serving

For Veggie Sauté:

1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 small onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1/8 teaspoon freshly cracked black pepper
3 ears of corn, kernels removed (about 1 1/2 cups)
3 cups green beans, trimmed and cut in half on a bias
1/2 cup radishes, halved (quartered if larger)
1 1/2 cups grape tomatoes, halved
1 teaspoon Stubb’s Bar-B-Q Spice Rub
1 tablespoon white wine vinegar
1/4 cup water
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt

Instructions

For the ribs: Pat ribs dry and sprinkle generously with Pork Spice Rub, rubbing it all over the meat. Place in a covered container and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes and up to overnight (I did 3 hours). Remove the meat from the refrigerator while you prepare your smoker.
Smoke meat according to your BBQ/smoker’s directions for pork ribs (this typically takes several hours to yield a tender piece of meat). You can brush the ribs with your favorite BBQ sauce during the last half hour of cooking.
For the veggie sauté: When the ribs are almost done, heat butter and oil in a large sauté pan over medium heat. Add onion, garlic, salt and pepper and cook until the onion starts to soften. Add corn, beans, radishes, tomatoes and spice rub and stir well to combine.
Once the tomatoes start to melt down, increase the heat to medium-high and stir in vinegar, water and 1/4 teaspoon salt. Continue to cook, stirring occasionally, until the liquid reduces and the veggies are crisp-tender.
Serve veggies alongside smoked ribs with extra BBQ sauce for dipping. Enjoy!