Slow cooked, sticky spare ribs

It’s been a long time between recipes!

My boys are now young men and it’s rare that the three of us sit at the dinner table together.

If you have a roasting pan with a lid, this one is a beauty - quick to prep, slow to cook, and all done in the pan.

Ingredients

1 kg rack of beef spare ribs (pork is also very good)

200g eschallots, peeled and separated into individual bulbs. Slice the bigger bulbs in half. 

Rub

• 1 tbsp brown sugar
• 2 tsp paprika
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• 1 tsp onion flakes
• .5 tsp cumin powder
• .75 tsp mustard powder
• 1 tsp salt
• .5 tsp white pepper

BBQ sauce

• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• .5 cup apple cider vinegar
• 1.25 cups ketchup or tomato sauce
• .25 cup brown sugar
• 2 tsp each white pepper, onion flakes, mustard powder
• 1 tsp cayenne pepper
• 2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
• 1.5 cups water

Chopped parsley or chives for garnish

Method

1. Preheat oven to 160°C
2. Mix rub ingredients in a small bowl
3. Rub in the mixture to all sides of the rib rack
4. Mix BBQ sauce ingredients, except water, in the roasting pan. Then mix in water
5. Place ribs in sauce, turning to coat. Remove, then drop in the eschallots. Put the rib racks on top, arranging them bone-side down, sort or arching over the eschallots.
6. Cook covered for 3.5 hours
7. Remove from oven, baste with sauce and return, uncovered, to the oven.
8. Cook for 30 minutes, basting with the sauce again halfway through
9. Remove ribs onto serving plate. The surface of the ribs will be caramelised and sticky. The eschallots will be soft explosions of sweet, savoury yumminess.
10. Mix sauce to bring together, adding a little water if necessary to produce a pourable sauce.
11. For serving, the ribs will be falling apart and so easy to separate 

I served this with linguine and steamed broccolini. There were no leftovers. None.

These became sweet and savoury little explosions of yumminess