Rookie needs help

I'd venture that they are losing moisture and getting tough. I cooked for a couple of years on a bullet water smoker and settled on the following technique for fallin' off the bone ribs:

- Remove the membrane on the back of the ribs, coat with a thin layer of mustard and then rub
- smoke at 225 for 3 hours using about 6oz of wood
- remove, foil, and move to the oven at 225 for another two hours
- refrigerate overnight
- grill to reheat, adding sauce in the last 10 minutes to caramelize

The cookshack retains much more moisture than a water smoker, but I still like to foil for those folks who like it fallin' off the bone (most).

Personally I like them to tug off the bone - I believe that by the time they're fallin' off the bone you've lost some key flavor.

By the way, welcome to the forum! You may not have a Cookshack, but there's wisdom aplenty here for smoking, that's for sure.

Hoppy,

You'll get a lot of help in the Open Forum, and since this one is for FE's I'm going to more you over there, as there is a little more traffic.

Welcome to the group.

Now, first question, are you trying to smoke them on the Kettle?

There's a good group here and they'll jump in and help, as they have many others.

Smokin'

Smokin, I am using a Meco water smoker to smoke the ribs. I have tried temps average 225 for 4-5 hours & again temps 200 ave. for 6+ hrs. Each time I though they were too dry, tasty but dry and not fall off the bone, as I would like.

I was never a big rib fan but since I started smoking my own I can get enough. I remove the membrane, coat them with mustard and rub, smoke for 4-5 hours at 225, slop on some bbq and wrap them in foil, throw back in the smoker for another hour or less with the temp turned down to say 150. I like them moist, but so that they don�t fall apart when you pick them up. I would recommend purchasing a cook shack if you can, best food related purchase I�ve ever made. Sometimes I get the ribs rubbed up the night before and then throw them in the smoker when I run home for lunch at noon. Smells like heaven when I get home.

Hoppy...

I used to use a Meco smoker til I got a Weber Kettle... I used the same methods of cooking pork ribs in both... Eventually, I found I didn't need the Meco anymore... I make real good ribs in my Weber--just as good if not better than I make in my Cookshack...Although the Cookshack is much, much, much less work....

In a Meco or Kettle, I use a Weber ribrack, put coals on one side of the kettle and place a water pan under the ribs... The first couple of hours I foil up a couple of handfuls of apple or cherry wood chips and place the foil packets(one at a time) on the coals--each packet burns out in 30-45min.

I cook the rubbed ribs for about 3 hrs at 200-250, mopping every 30min or so w/apple juice...

At 3hrs or so, I place all the ribs in foil, add a half cup or so of apple juice and let it cook another couple of hours--same temp--they come out real nice...

Mopping is real important and so is foiling-at-the-end in a kettle... I cooked up a lot of dry ribs before I started doing those things...

Best of luck...

Darn forum, got me hungry again. I stopped at the closest market on the way home for lunch just now. They had some spare ribs that didn't look to impresive so I chose to go with some country style beef ribs. Big pieces of meat with no bone, haven't tried them before. I rubbed em up and stuck them in, will see what we have when we get home!

I wonder if I am smoking them to much. I have been adding soaked chips (Jack Daniels Hickory chips) every hour or so, through out. Is that too much??

I only use one little piece of wood, about the the size of 1/3 to 1/4 of a deck of cards. I believe that's what most other here do as well. Put some sauce on them and wrap them in foil for the last hour, it'll make you happy.

Tony, Hoppy isn't using a CS, but a Meco

Hoppy, the answer to "am I smoking them too much" will be told when you eat them. If they're black and smell like soot and taste like you're licking an ash tray, then yes.

If they taste fine to you, then you used just the right amount

Had thing for us to tell, you'll have to be the first judge.

Isn't that still electric..?The amount of wood would change?

Not being a Meco expert, I'll defer to someone who has a Meco and a CS.

I have used other electrics and the size of their element puts it in direct contact with the wood and it burns entirely different than in a CS.

You MECO experts, jump in here...

I am using a charcoal Meco, not a electric.

Fall off the bone, by definition would be a rib that's overcooked to the point of the meat being so tender, it's actually hard to cut because the meat falls apart when you slice it.

You just need to cook them longer to get to that point.

I have just received my fec100 and need to know the right way to season the smoker. I have been cooking on a Austin National Smoker for about a year and before that an Oklahoma Joe offset smoker. I was told to turn it to smoke for four minutes, then turn it off and back on to what temp I wanted it to be at. I did this and it never got over 50 degrees. Also the pot overflowed with pellets.
I'd appreciate any advice I can get.

Joe,

Just an FYI, you won't get much help on FE's in the CS Open Forum. We've got a whole set of forums just for FE owners...Jump into the FE Forums, Owners Section and we can help.

Sounds like your igniter didn't ignite. Just turn it on to a temp, don't turn it off and see if that works, they we'll talk procedure.

Smokin'