Oven Barbeque Beef Ribs

You ever have those times where you go into the grocery store, and you don't have a budget in mind, you have about $4 in your pocket? I had that and was sure dinner was going to be "food" at best. I was wrong. I saw a slab of beef ribs on special for $1.50 off, making them about $2.70. I've only cooked beef short ribs, or pork ribs, but I knew I could make this work if I tried. I totally would've made macaroni and cheese from scratch if I had the fundage, but a pasta-roni on sale did the trick. Lucky for me, I had some sweet and sour sauce at home, and a bottle of ketchup. I knew I could jazz up a barbecue sauce. For a first try, I would totally recommend these if you're like me and don't have a grill, or couldn't work a charcoal one if you tried  :)

Barbeque Short Ribs

This picture is of short ribs, but most of mine were pretty short and looked almost identical to this picture. Yummy charred bits and all. I think part of my secret here is the two step cooking process, which brings cooking down to about two hours, and they are sooooo good. I'll add a note about my barbecue sauce, but it's not my recipe (yet), just a dash of this and that, but for those who don't measure, its a good one. 

Barbecue Beef Ribs:

1 1/2 to 2lb rack of ribs

Leftover veggies (ends of onions, lemon wedge, etc.)

Crushed garlic clove

Cajun seasoning

Black pepper

Water

Barbecue sauce

For pork ribs, which is my usual go to, I cook them low and slow covered in foil, and then I broil them. These looked considerably tougher, so I took a different approach. Fill a pot (enough to fit your ribs after being cut into portions) with water. Put in some of your leftover veggies to flavor your water. I used green onion, white onion, and some lemon. Add your crushed garlic clove and seasoning. Cut your ribs into portions, and boil them for an hour. In the meantime, preheat your oven to 350 and bring out your barbecue sauce, or *make some. Take your boiled ribs onto a cutting board. I removed the silver skin, which is a white or light yellow looking tough layer that you can't really eat through. You can try to pull this off, or use your knife. The boiling helps loosen it and make it easier. Put the portions onto a baking sheet and brush on one side with the barbecue sauce. Bake or 30 minutes until dark and delicious looking, then flip and repeat. After one hour total, those babies are done. MMMMMMMM.......ribs

* I had about 1/2 a cup of a ketchup based sweet and sour sauce, and I turned it into barbecue sauce. For this one, I went sweeter. I will estimate measurements, but I didn't actually measure. I added 1/4 cup ketchup, 1 1/2 tbsp worcestershire, 1 clove of garlic finely chopped, 1 tbsp dijon mustard, 1/2 tbsp vinegar, 1 tbsp chili powder, and 2 rounded tbsp raspberry jam. I cooked it for about ten minutes and it was good to go.