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Beef Ribs

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mrPalomar

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Just put some nice looking beef ribs on the Primo XL. Rubbed with Magic Dust and cooking them with apple chunks. Last time I cooked these the silverskin on the back made them near inedible so I went at them pretty hard with the trimming this time around. A friend of mine claims that in good ribs the silverskin will soften up enough that you can chew it, what is the consensus here on how to trim beef ribs?

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Silverskin may be able to breakdown to collagen in some form or fashion but the plural membrane will never ever breakdown. If the anatomy of an animal is similar to that of the human anatomy, the membrane on ribs is the covering on the lungs and that is why there are 2 layers on ribs. The visceral is what we peel away and the parietal is the layer left on the rib that holds the bones in place. I would get rid of the silverskin, it will not add to the meat and will likely take away from it.
 
Yeah, I'm pretty sure he was talking about the membrane under the silverskin. With the last batch I cooked that membrane was very difficult to chew, so I removed it this time. Hopefully they'll still hold together alright and won't dry out too.
 
I have a terrible time getting rid of the membrane on the beef ribs I buy so I just leave it. It can be a little of a pain but when cooked the meat pulls away so cleanly that it has never been an issue for me. By the way, nice looking ribs. Cant wait to see the outcome.
 
Yeah, the first rack took probably 15 minutes to clean up, but i did much better on the second one. I found that it was easiest to slide a paring knife in at each rib from the end to separate the membrane there and then work my way between the ribs. I was able to pull a good section (2 inches or so) of the membrane from the long end that way and then i worked my way across the flat section and up along the curve last. The second rack only took about 5 minutes and looked much better than my first hack at it.

I peeked at the ribs a little bit ago and they look fantastic, my only worry is that they're going to finish too early. Thinking about foiling them in a cooler for a couple of hours then returning them to the grill to sauce and finish them up.
 
I am no expert on beef ribs, as I have only done them a handful of times, but in my experience I have found that I much preferred the ribs after I spent the time to remove the silverskin.

Not to derail the thread, and I suppose this topic wouldn't be really doing so, but has anyone else had a tougher time removing the membrane on beef ribs as opposed to pork ribs, which I find to be quite easy. I don't know why it has worked out that way for me, but I have had a heck of a time removing the membrane on the few racks of beef ribs I have prepared. As I said before, I think that were far better that way, so I will continue to do so in the future, extra work or not. Just wondered if anyone else out that had had a similar experience.

EDIT: Originally I had clicked on this thread a few hours ago, got distracted by other activities, and just returned to the computer. I see now that a couple of the more recent responses address what I was talking about.
 
Jeez Tamadrummer, hope you didn't have some human ribs to do a side by side comparison...:pray:
 
jalon said:
Jeez Tamadrummer, hope you didn't have some human ribs to do a side by side comparison...:pray:
Click to expand...

Just trying to give the "Alton Brown" education side of what that membrane is. I believe that, that membrane is exactly the same as ours is.

Sorry if my lesson in Anatomy and Physiology was offensive. :doh:
 
The ribs turned out great! I'm glad I ended up removing the membrane, they were much easier to eat than the last time around.

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I started them at 11:30am and then took them off and foiled them with some beef broth at 2:30pm because I was worried they'd be done too quickly. They went into a cooler at that point and I pulled them at 4:30, sauced them and cooked them for another hour. Cooked at 240 for the duration. They still had a good amount of chew and could have been cooked for another 30 minutes or so without hurting them, but they were delicious as is.
 
MAn, they do look perfect, but what is that brown stuff on them in the last pic? I would be scraping that off. :p
 
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