Short Ribs vs. Plate Ribs

I’ve never had both at the same time and the length of time between them always made the memory fuzzy. Well, say no more.

Last weekend I saw some thick ass short ribs at the Chinese market so I pounced on it, stiff arming a grandma or two at the butcher line. The plan was to do a Sunday morning smoke with and plate it with some grits and corn. Wife had different plans so I let it wet age a bit.

Next weekend I’ll be in NYC so I wanted one last smoke before summer (August) is over so I went to the local butcher shop and asked if they had any plate ribs. They did! It was frozen but I took it anyway. I also fondled Davy Crockett and Daniel Boone while I was there. No irrational thoughts came up so I walked away with just the plate ribs.

Short ribs were $3.99/lb; $8.99/lb for the plate. You’re looking at 3 pounds and 5 pounds here.







Dusted with Q-Salt and Memphis dry rub for some color.













The 6” stem Tel-Trus are AMAZING. Never understood the hype but now I’m a believer. Temps matched the digital and analog therms I had in the cooker. The lower left stem shows the temp right above the ribs, so it’s understandably lower. Pics of the ribs at 2 hours.

4 hour update:

Stingerhook said:

Nice bones, that smoker looks awful lonely though.

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I added 5 bratwursts though!

The plate rib was further in the chamber so it had more heat. It was jiggly and calling my name. I wrapped the short ribs in BP and threw it in the oven to hold at 170F.

LYU370 said:

So which one is which? How does the taste compare between the two?

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The ones cut so far are plate ribs (the one on the right in the finished shot). The short ribs are a bit leaner so it’s taking some sauna time right now.

Here are the short ribs after a 3 hour hold. For a crowd, I would get the short ribs. I could have 3 racks of short ribs for the price of a plate rib but I’m not sure how much of the butcher premium is in the price. However I would definitely splurge on myself with just the plate rib if I wanted brisket point flavor without the excess.