Feb. 23 - Ribs!!

Okay, so I have this bizarre fear of cooking ribs. I think it's because I've never met a rib I didn't enjoy - whether from Chili's, Tony Roma's, Damon's, T-Bonz (Myrtle Beach), etc. Hell, even the premade kind you get from the grocery are half-decent and nearly impossible to screw up.

So when I came across a crockpot ribs recipe, I'll admit it...I was nervous. I didn't want to spend $15 on meat that ended up trashed. I didn't want to take the effort to make the marinade, just to have it poo-poo'ed by the rest of the family. But, I wanted to conquer this inane trepidation, and figured I better have at it.

The recipe I found was on allrecipes.com - one of my absolute favorite recipe sites! It had well over 600 reviews, with an overall rating of 4.5 (out of 5) stars. I always read the reviews on the front page, too, for changes or suggestions (these are the ones voted most helpful), and used those in fixing up my recipe. Here's what I ended up with:

Slow Cooker Ribs
Ingredients
4 lbs. pork baby back ribs
salt, pepper, minced onion and garlic powder to taste
2 cups Cattleman barbecue sauce
1 cup ketchup (only Heinz in this household!)
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
4 tablespoons red wine vinegar
2 teaspoons dried oregano
2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
1 dash of hot sauce

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C).
2. Season ribs with salt, pepper, minced onion and garlic powder. Place in a shallow baking pan. Brown in oven 15 minutes. Turn over, and brown another 15 minutes; drain fat.
3. In a medium bowl, mix together the barbecue sauce, ketchup, brown sugar, vinegar, oregano, Worcestershire sauce, and hot sauce. Place ribs in slow cooker. Pour sauce over ribs, and turn to coat.
4. Cover, and cook on low 6 to 8 hours, or until ribs are tender.
5. About 30 minutes before serving, place back in baking pan at 400 degrees F and the sauce will caramelize to the meat and finish them to perfection.

They turned out SO, SO DELICIOUS! Oh my word, I can't believe how easy they were, and how scrumptious they tasted. I swear, this was better than I ever could have imagined! I roasted corn in the oven to go with them and that tasted great, too. It was just frozen corn, 2 tablespoons of butter, and a little salt and pepper sprinkled on top. I roasted it at 400 degrees F for about 30 minutes (same as the ribs), and it turned out perfectly. Veggies in the oven, I've learned, taste much better than microwaved, steamed or boiled veggies.

If you need one more reason to try these, even the little man ate nearly an entire rib?!? He can barely tolerate applesauce and mashed bananas, but give him some rib meat and he's in heaven! Linds devoured it happily, too.

So, yeah, two days into the week, and two phenomenal meals down. I'm almost worried about tomorrow's dinner - it will probably be quite a let-down after cornbread enchilada casserole and spare ribs- but that's okay, I conquered my fear of cooking ribs and have a great new meal to add to the collection!