Beth's Melt in Your Mouth Barbecue Ribs

Richard loves ribs and is often wanting to go out somewhere so he can get them.  Ribs get to be a bit expensive in restaurants so we decided to give them a try at home.  Plus they were on sale at the store so that was an added bonus.  I searched online looking at lots and lots of recipes, this one seemed pretty easy and sounded like it would be good.  Who doesn't want the ribs falling off the bone?  And they really did fall right off the bone, I was actually able to lift the bones right out of the meat.  They were so tender!

I made the recipe below but used 1 cup of BBQ sauce and 3 lbs of ribs, (I bought the kind that had extra meat).  I cut it up into 7 equal parts when I went to do the broiling part at the end, each part ended up 11 points.  I think half of one of those on a sandwich thin will make a wonderful lunch tomorrow! 

As for the barbeque sauce, I tried a new one.  Since I've started looking at labels more I've tried really hard to avoid high fructose corn syrup.  It seems like most barbeque sauces have that as the first or second ingredient, especially the ones at eye level.  I'm serious when I say it was the first ingredient for more than one brand.  So I picked up this Bull's-Eye Barbeque Sauce, it was on the bottom shelf at the store.  I got the sweet and tangy variety since that sounded closest to the variety that we normally go for when we eat at the barbecue place in town.  It was very good, might not have been the cheapest one on the shelf but it was certainly worth it in my opinion (and it wasn't that much more).  It's always worth it to check the ingredients, while studies on high fructose corn syrup are conflicting regarding the effect on our health, why not eat the more natural version if possible?  

Anyways, the ribs were fabulous!  They fell right off the bone and were so very very tasty!  We are planning on making them again and again, next time we'll do the finishing part on the grill outside.  We're thinking barbeque ribs for the 4th of July this year.  It's always nice to have a change from the regular barbeque foods.  And who doesn't like ribs?  And if I go buy more ribs while they are still on sale it won't be much different then buying a bunch of hamburgers.  I just finished these ones for dinner and I'm already salivating at the thought of more ribs in a couple months.  Yep, they are that good!

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Beth's Melt in Your Mouth Barbecue Ribs (Oven) Recipe

I almost didn't want to share this recipe because this is one of the dishes that I make that keep my sons coming back home! These can be done with baby back or regular pork ribs. I have also made split chickens this way. The ribs are tender, moist and just slide off of the bone. I know that your family will love them just as much as my family does. I noticed that some are unable to find hickory smoked salt.. You can use smoked paprika or just brush the ribs with liquid smoke before applying the rub. The smoke flavor is nice because it helps give the ribs a cooked on the grill flavor. Also, the easiest way to remove the membrane is to work a spoon or I use the tips of my kitchen sheers into the bottom center of the membrane, work it back and forth to form a "pocket" then I slide my thumbs in and work the membrane off from the center outward to the ends.

By Not-2-Sweet

3¼ hours
15 min prep

SERVES about 6-7 

4 lbs pork ribs
3/4 cup light brown sugar
1 teaspoon hickory smoke salt
1 tablespoon paprika
1 tablespoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon ground red pepper (optional)
2 cups of your favorite barbecue sauce (mine is Sweet Baby Ray)

1.Preheat oven to 300 degrees f.

2.Peel off tough membrane that covers the bony side of the ribs.

3.Mix together the sugar and spices to make the rub.

4.Apply rub to ribs on all sides.

5.Lay ribs on two layers of foil, shiny side out and meaty side down.

6.Lay two layers of foil on top of ribs and roll and crimp edges tightly, edges facing up to seal.

7.Place on baking sheet and bake for 2-2 1/2 hours or until meat is starting to shrink away from the ends of the bone.

8.Remove from oven.

9.Heat broiler.

10.Cut ribs into serving sized portions of 2 or 3 ribs.

11.Arrange on broiler pan, bony side up.

12.Brush on sauce.

13.Broil for 1 or 2 minutes until sauce is cooked on and bubbly.

14.Turn ribs over.

15.Repeat on other side.

16.Alternately, you can grill the ribs on your grill to cook on the sauce.

Loaded Hashbrowns

Richard was really wanting the loaded hash browns from Sherry's, they are super tasty and once he started talking about them I wanted them as well.  I decided to try them at home as I am certain these were far better for me then if I had gone to the restaurant and ordered them.  This was yummy!  Certainly something I'll make again!

How I made the "loaded" hash browns:

Take 1 cup shredded hash browns (I used the simply hash browns that come from the refrigerated section) and place them on the George Foreman grill, use a spray of olive oil on the Foreman before placing the hash browns on.  Flip the hash browns at least once while cooking to get more of that crunchy cooked hash brown texture. 

When taking the hash browns off the grill place half the hash browns on the plate.  Put 1 Tbsp light sour cream and 1/8 cup shredded reduced fat mexican style cheese on top of the hash browns. Place the other half of the hash browns on top of that and sprinkle the top with another 1/8 cup cheese (I used a little less then that on top and used the other bit in the scrambled eggs).

Enjoy!

Random cooking: Chicken Tacos, Kabobs and Fish

Of everything I've made since starting WW and decided to try new recipes, these are probably my favorite thing so far.  The only thing that really makes it "new" is I used ground chicken, I've made tacos before. But these were great the night I made them and they made absolutely wonderful leftover salads for the next few days as well.  I made them during one of the weeks I wasn't logging (or measuring much), so I'm not sure the points, the best I could figure out estimating is probably about 4-5 points a taco or salad, I used Lite house honey dijon light salad dressing instead of the shell so I think it should be about the same.

I used ground chicken with taco seasoning, black beans, Mexican style shredded cheese, lettuce and tomato all on a small wheat tortilla.  These were super tasty and I prefered the ground chicken to both beef and turkey.  I reheated the ground chicken and black beans and put them on a bowl of lettuce with a small amount of cheese and cut up tomatoes with the lite house honey dijon salad dressing.  I love that salad dressing and it went wonderfully with the taco salad.  I think I had the salad about 4 times after the tacos that night.  I love this!  Must make it again sometime soon.

My favorite part of this meal was by far the stir fried teriyaki asian style vegetables.  I only ate about two of the little steaks off the skewer and gave the rest to Richard.  The skewers were in the quick sale section at the store at a great deal so I got them to try something new.  I think I was probably just having an anti beef kind of night, sometimes I think I could live quite well as a vegetarian, but I always realize how much I would miss fish and scratch that idea.  I would also miss chicken and steak and pork, oh and bacon (or turkey bacon which is what I've been eating recently).  Yep, tasty veggies indeed though!  And I'm sure they weren't that high point but I'm really not sure as I also made these in one of the weeks I wasn't tracking.

I revisited the Pan Fried Tilapia with White Wine and Caper that I made awhile back.  I had intended to have the frozen microwave brown rice from Trader Joes with it but I then found out we were out of rice so I just had a few more veggies instead.  I love this fish, certainly worth making again and again!

Well, that's all the pictures of food I had sitting around without a blog attached.  Now they are on a blog and all is well.  Yummy stuff.

Lemon-Orange Orange Roughy

I haven't been the best about cooking new things recently (or writing about it if I did), but tonight I decided to try something new.  This is very citrusy and very tasty.  I would recommend having something like the quinoa to mix with the sauce and fish to take the edge off the citrus flavor.  Mine might have ended up a little stronger since I got the quinoa started later then planned and was able to reduce the orange sauce probably more then they would have.  But it was very tasty!  I love the orange roughy!  So yum!  ___________________________________

Lemon-Orange Orange Roughy

Ingredients:
1 spray olive oil
4 (4 ounce) fillets orange roughy
1 orange, juiced
1 lemon, juiced
1/2 teaspoon lemon herb (it called for lemon pepper but I don't do pepper)

Directions:
Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Arrange fillets in the skillet, and drizzle with orange juice and lemon juice. Sprinkle with lemon herb. Cook for 5 minutes, or until fish is easily flaked with a fork.