Sriracha Ribs

Sriracha Ribs sounds like I’m jumping on the Sriracha mania that swept the world via social media a while back. Truth is, I was a huge fan of the rooster sauce well before there was a so called shortage. I finally decided to do a Sriracha post because World Harbors Marinades partnered with me to do a post using their fine products. Since I love Sriracha and I love ribs, I couldn’t pass up combining the two and making some Sriracha Ribs.

Sriracha Ribs Ingredients:

• 1 bottle, World Harbors Sriracha Marinade, divided
• 2 slabs, St. Louis style ribs, membrane on the bone side removed
• 1 quart apple juice
• 1/4 cup salt
• 3 cloves minced garlic
• Salt (to season one slab after marinating)
• Your favorite BBQ rub

Take one slab of skinned ribs and place it in a resealable plastic bag with about 1/3 of the bottle of World Harbors Sriracha marinade. Make sure to coat both sides and work the sauce around inside the bag to cover the entirety of the slab.

In a second bag, put the apple juice, garlic, and salt. Work the liquid around until the salt dissolves. Then add the second slab of ribs. Place both bags in the fridge overnight.

How to Grill Sriracha Ribs

The following day, prepare the grill for two zone or indirect grilling with coals on one side and nothing on the other. While the grill comes up to temp, head inside and finish prepping the ribs.

For the ribs marinating in the Sriracha, remove them from the bag, place them meat side down on the cutting board and hit the bone side with coarse salt. Flip over and hit the meat side with salt.

Pro Tip ~ Always salt/season/rub the bone side first so when the ribs are flipped over, the natural concave of the bones will keep the meat off the cutting board and thus more of the salt/seasoning/rub will stay on the meat. 

For the ribs in the brine, remove from the liquid, pat dry with paper towels and apply the BBQ rub bone side first. Wait five minutes for the rub to completely adhere. Flip over and repeat on the meat side.

Once the grill reaches 275F-300F, place the ribs on the side of the grill with no coals and put a chunk of smoke wood on the coals which is known as two zone or indirect grilling.

In this case, I used apricot wood:

After 1 hour, the Sriracha Ribs are browning up nicely:

Pour the remainder of the bottle of World Harbors Sriracha Marinade/Basting Sauce/Dipping Sauce into a bowl:

Then baste the ribs with the Sriracha sauce:

Continue to baste the ribs every 20-30 minutes.

After about two hours, I moved the sauced ribs closer to the fire and the rubbed ribs away:

The ribs are pretty much done about 2.5 – 3 hours depending on the heat of the grill and weight of the ribs:

How do I know they’re done? The bones are peeking out at me.

When the bones stick out between 1/3 to 1/2 an inch, they are done:

Another indicator is the flex of the slab. When they went on raw, you could practically fold them in half.

As the fat renders out and the meat tightens up, they become more rigid and less bendy. If bendy is not a word, it should be.

Pro Tip part deux ~ Watch the bones instead of the clock when trying to figure out when the ribs are done. The bones never lie!

Here’s my rubbed slab that finished before the sauced slab, which sometimes happens.

This slab is ready for some of the World Harbors Sriracha dipping sauce:

How did I do?

Don’t forget the obligatory drip shot when photographing a dipping sauce:

I was so pleased with the pics from this shoot that I decided to include a few more here that are really not needed for the recipe, but hey, if you’ve read this far, you probably won’t be at all put out by these extra pics:

The sauced Sriracha Ribs are done:

And sliced:

Let’s not forget that magical elixir known as the World Harbors Sriracha Marinade:

I almost forgot the bite shot. If you dig fall off the bone ribs, these aren’t them. To do that, foil the ribs at the 2 hour mark for about 90 minutes and then pull from the foil and throw them back on the grill for 30-60 minutes.

These are more competition style ribs.

Being a certified judge, one of the things to look for is a clean bite that is not possible with fall off the bone ribs:

Ribs Run Down

But how did they taste? I was quite impressed with the results. I did this test run with the thought that I might have to add some honey or brown sugar to the marinade to soften the heat and add some sweet. But I didn’t feel the need to doctor it at all. That’s sort of against my nature. I’m always tweaking recipes.

The second thing that surprised me was that the sauced ribs were not as spicy as the ribs that were dunked in the sauce. I expected the sauced ribs to intensify the heat in the Sriracha but in fact, it some how lessened. The rubbed ribs that were dunked were much hotter. The basted ribs were a perfect balance between sweet and heat. My parents, both of whom have little tolerance for spicy food, ate the sauced ribs. 

Also, check out the Jerk Bacon Wrapped Ribs I did with World Harbors jerk marinade and the Grilled Shrimp Lollipops marinated in the Thai Sweet Chili Sauce plus a bonus Shrimp Cocktail Shooter at the end of that post.

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Recipe Card:

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4 from 1 vote

Sriracha Ribs

Ribs marinated in Sriracha, basted in Sriracha and then dipped in Sriracha. An extremely simple recipe for sweet heat spare ribs.

Prep Time10 minutes mins

Cook Time3 hours hrs

Total Time3 hours hrs 10 minutes mins

Course: Ribs

Cuisine: BBQ

Ingredients

• 1 bottle World Harbors Sriracha Marinade divided
• 2 slab St. Louis style ribs membrane on the bone side removed
• 1 qt apple juice
• ¼ cup salt
• 3 clove garlic minced
• salt
• your favorite BBQ rub

Instructions

• Place one slab of skinned ribs in a resealable plastic bag with 1/3 of the bottle of World Harbor Sriracha marinade, working the marinade around to ensure it coats the meat entirely
• Combine the apple juice, salt, and garlic in another bag and mix until the salt is dissolved
• Place the second slab of ribs in the bag and place both in the fridge for 4-12 hours
• Remove the ribs from the bags
• For the Sriracha ribs, simply salt the bone side first and then the meat side
• For the brined ribs, apply your favorite BBQ rub to the bone side and then the meat side
• Prepare the grill for two zone grilling with coals on one side and nothing on the other
• Target temperature inside the grill is 300 +/- 25 degrees
• Place the meat, bone side down on the side with no coals and a chunk of smoke wood on the other side (I used Apricot)
• Pour the remainder of the Sriracha marinade into a bowl
• After an hour on the grill, coat the Sriracha ribs with a basting of the marinade
• Repeat the basting every 20-30 minutes until the ribs are done
• When the bones poke out about 1/3 - 1/2 inch, the ribs are done (approximately 2.5 - 3 hours)
• Remove from the grill and slice
• Serve the dry rubbed ribs with the bowl of the marinade that doubles as a basting sauce and triples as a dipping sauce

Scott Thomas

Scott Thomas, the Original Grillin’ Fool, was sent off to college with a suitcase and a grill where he overcooked, undercooked and burned every piece of meat he could find. After thousands of failures, and quite a few successes, nearly two decades later he started a website to show step by step, picture by picture, foolproof instructions on how to make great things out of doors so that others don’t have to repeat the mistakes he’s made on the grill.

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BBQ Grilling

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This article was initially published on: May 20, 2015