1st Cook on WSM Score! Beef Short Ribs (Dino Ribs)!

Long time lurker, first time thread starter. The Brethren has been a great resource for me as I got into smoking. And it's where I got one heckuva deal on a 22.5 WSM courtesy of Moose of the Brethren! Thanks, Moose! I promised him I'd put up pics of my cook with the WSM, so here it is...

So for my first cook ever on a WSM, I decided to do beef short ribs (this was the first time I ever cooked beef ribs). Yup, my genius brain wanted to cook something I've never done before on a cooker I've never used before. :crazy: Luckily, things turned out better than expected.

Found some nice uncut short ribs at a Korean market. I had to ask the meat guy at the counter to check in the back. He brought out a couple packs, and I chose one that looked the best to me.



Prepped, rubbed, and ready to go.


Onto the cooker.


The awesome WSM chugging along. As you can see, its previous owner took very good care of it. :grin:


Side profile with the Pitmaster IQ110 attached (honestly didn't need it considering how easy it is to dial in the right temp and how well it holds once you set it). You can see the nice, thin blue smoke coming out the top vent. Beautiful.


After 3 hours at around 280 degrees.


All done after about 5 hours of total cook time.



Cut into individual dino ribs. These were a lot a bigger than I expected.


The money shot.


The ribs came out very tender and juicy. Overall, I was happy with the ribs. And I was very happy with how well the WSM performs. Except for one minor hiccup temperature spike (cause still unknown), that thing held temp like a champ.

Thanks again, Moose, for the awesome deal on the WSM! I know my family was very happy with the end results...

jeffturnerjr said:

Great looking ribs! I haven't cooked many beef ribs. I see that you cooked 5 hours at 280. Is that a pretty typical cook time/and temp for beef back ribs?

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Not sure if beef back ribs are the same as the short ribs I cooked. I've never done beef back ribs before, so I don't know.

This was my first time cooking short ribs, and I scoured the internet looking for different methods. The most common I've come across is cooking at 275. I was actually planning on doing a 3-2-1 (3 hours unwrapped, 2 hours wrapped in foil, and 1 hour wrapped), but I noticed that after the first 3 hours, the ribs were actually probing pretty tender. So I switched the timing and cooked it covered for another 45 minutes (per Harry Soo of Slap Yo Daddy) and checked for tenderness after. It was probing really well, so I unwrapped it and set it back on for another half hour to try and get a better texture for the bark. Also, I checked to see how easily the meat was separating from the bone when I stuck my probe in there. So I pulled it when I felt the ribs were indicating that they were done. I was aiming for 275, but the cooker kind of settled around 280 on its own, and I didn't fight it. So the cook ended up being about 3 hours unwrapped, 45 minutes wrapped, and 30 minutes unwrapped.

I try to use times as mere guidelines, but ultimately, the feel and look of the ribs helps me to decide whether it's done or not. Hope that helps!