Smoked Rib Soup

A few days ago I decided to make some ribs in my drum smoker, the ribs were trimmed from Spareribs to St. Louis style, which left me with the rib tips. Traditional U.S. style would dictate that these rib tips would be smoked and used as appetizers or "cook's treats". But, I don't happen to enjoy rib tips in this way, so I decided to make them into a pork stock. Eventually, I was going to shoot for making Xiao long bau, that hasn't happened yet. I did make noodle soup though.

Left-over Smoked Ribs

Pork Broth:
4 quarts of water
rib tips from one rack of spareribs
1-1/2" ginger, split in half
3 cloves garlic, lightly crushed
2 star anise
8 Phu Quoc peppercorns, black
6 whole cloves
1 2" length of cinnamon stick

Bring all ingredients to a low simmer, the idea is to have almost no bubbles and to very slowly steep the ingredients to create a clean, clear broth. The steep runs about 180F and goes for around 4 hours. This is filtered, cooled and skimmed. You'll notice there is not a lot of salt, this allows me to control the salt later in the cook and gives me flexibility later in the cook.

Noodle Dough before rest

Not Hand-pulled Noodles

Noodles:
3/4 cup bread flour
1/4 cup all-purpose whole wheat flour
1/4 cup very hot water
2 tablespoons neutral oil

Sift flours together to blend, place in bowl of blender with paddle attachment. Mix hot water and oil together and slowly add to flour as mixer is running on low speed. The dough will start to come together as you add water. Only add enough water to make the dough into a rough loose dough. Remove and knead for 5 to 7 minutes by hand. Wrap dough in plastic wrap tightly and allow to rest for at least an hour. These will be Lamian-style noodles except I don't hand pull them. I use a pasta roller, after a couple of minutes of kneading to refresh the gluten, I roll it three times through a flat pasta roller, then use the spaghetti cutter to form the noodles. Then into boiling salty water for 2 to 3 minutes.

The Soup:
4 left-over ribs
4 cups prok broth
1 cup water
1/4 cup Red Boat fish sauce
2 fresh shiitake mushrooms sliced
green onions, cilantro to taste

This is a very simple soup, I simply simmered the ribs until the meat came off the bone, the mushrooms were added to cook, about 5 minutes before serving, I add the fish sauce. The green onions and cilantro are added just a minute or two before serving. Here is also where the lack of use of sugars and salts in the preparation of the broth comes in. I use Red Boat and call it out by brand for a spefic reason, it has no added sugars or preservatives, I believe it has a distinct flavor that is salty, sweet and pungent. Adding it is an easy cheat to add a dimension of dashi, a subtle sweetness and a taste of the sea.

Green onions, Cilantro and Shiitake

Pork Rib Soup, dark rich broth

Once the noodles have been boiled, the whole process goes pretty fast. The noodles need to go from boiling water to very hot soup, the herbal component should have just gone in as well. Since the noodles are fresh, they can overcook in a flash. 3 minutes might be just right, 3.5 minutes could well be mush. This makes a welcome and familiar dish for most anyone, but, particularly for anyone who grew up in an Asian family. Quick and simple.

Noodle Soup

Although the noodles add a great dimension of texture and help carry the flavor, as with all soups, the real deal is found in the broth, the pork broth I used as a base for the soup, along with all of the aromatics, really brings the flavor to this dish. The smoke and spice from the ribs, although not at all Chinese or Japanese in origin, really adds depth and complexity to the dish.

Look at that shine

Look at that shine, the use of the collagen rich rib tips really adds to the mouth feel of the stock, the addition of the herbs and fish sauce really enhances the highlight flavors of the broth. This soup really highlights the idea of a simple dish elevated with layers of flavors.

Smoked Ribs with Pacific Rim Mop

This past weekend, I had the opportunity to spend some time in Lake Tahoe at a friends mountain home, everyone needs a place to get away, and this is Rob's place to go hide from the world and think. This past weekend, we thought about ribs, slow smoked and tender.

 I even got to cook on a Big Green Egg, Rob has a large BGE at his Tahoe retreat and this was the first chance I had to cook on one of these. They have become increasingly popular, even as they are quite pricey for many of us, I can really see why they are so popular. This cooker is very responsive, very stable on temperature and used very little fuel. It was a real treat.

I decided to continue playing with my original idea of Pig Honey, but, to throw a few more elements into the recipe. Even more so, cooking with Rob ends up being a collaboration.  We started with extra meaty baby back ribs, stripped the membranes and rubbed with Simply Marvelous Cherry Rub. This is a classic sweet and spicy BBQ rub, a little more on the sweet side, but, that was perfect for my plans.

Now, here is where things get a little more exotic, not super exotic, just a little more. After putting the ribs on the BGE, with some lump charcoal and a few pieces of apple wood for smoke, I made some modified Pig Honey, in this case, to be used as a mop and glaze. The overall flavor range would be dominated by the savory additions of fish sauce and liquid amino acids along with some seasonings, including an incredible pepper blend called Mayan Pepper Blend. This features some old pepper varieties grown in Belize, hand harvested, roasted over open fires and flaked. This mix has an amazing smoky pepper aroma and quite a bite.

Pacific Rim Rib Mop
1/4 cup plus 3 tablespoons of Red Boat Fish Sauce
1/4 cup scant of Bragg's Liquid Aminos
1 teaspoon of smoked pepper flakes
1 teaspoon of smoked paprika
1 teaspoon Phu Quoc black pepper
1/8 cup brown sugar

The last five ingredients were brought to a low simmer to dissolve sugar. The heat was turned off and the fish sauce added. This was used to mop the ribs at the 2 hour mark, then it was mopped every half hour until done.

The last two moppings were also dusted with a finely grated palm sugar, to create a glaze. The palm sugar is actually a product of a form of Palmyra palm, although sugar from other palms is often used as well. We used the refined version of this sugar, which comes in the form of small, hard cones which need to be softened or ground prior to use. I chose to grind it into a fine powder, which I then sprinkled onto the ribs as they were mopped with the mop sauce.

The photo above shows the glaze effect pretty well, but, both racks actually had a great shine and the flavor was incredible. More importantly, they has in incredible depth of flavor, with the Mayan peppers ringing through with bright heat, and the palm sugar and residual sugar from the mop providing a balancing sweetness. The aromatic combination of all of these elements was just enticing, no other word works to describe it.