Chinese Steamed Spareribs

Tonight's dinner was supposed to be pork chops but I was craving some spare ribs so I went off to the store at the last minute to pick up some ribs. It's been more than a year since the first time that I prepared this dish, I used a different recipe then but I don't remember how it tasted.

This time, I found a recipe from SteamyKitchen that had fewer ingredients, was easier to prepare and hopefully, will be more memorable as hubby has already forgotten about the first steamed spareribs that I made but this, we love! I even scooped out the meat juices from the bowl and drenched my rice with it.

1-1/2 lbs pork sparerib (rib tips)
2 tablespoons black bean sauce (I used canned salted black beans)
1 tablespoon Chinese rice wine
2 teaspoons cornstarch
1/2 teaspoon grated ginger
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 teaspoon cooking oil
1 teaspoon sesame oil
1 teaspoon sugar

Preparation:

1. Cut the spareribs crosswise into 1″ – 2″ sections.
2. Combine the rest of the ingredients.
3. Transfer spareribs and sauce into a shallow, heatproof pan that will fit inside your wok (a pie plate or 9” cake pan works great.)
4. Let marinate at room temperature for 30 minutes.

Steaming:

1. Set steaming rack inside of wok and fill with water almost up to height of rack.
2. Turn heat to high and when water is boiling, turn heat to medium-high.
3. Set pan with spareribs on top of a steaming rack in wok.
4. Steam on med-high heat for 18-20 minutes until ribs are no longer pink.
5. Make sure that when you are steaming that you don’t run out of water in the wok. Replenish with additional water, if needed.

Steamed Spareribs

We currently have a whole freezer fully stocked with meat - thanks to the Shoprite coupons that we were able to use last week. One of the meat packages that we got was pork spare ribs. I was planning to make some "Salt and Pepper pork ribs" but I didn't want to do more frying because of the lingering smell that always permeates the kitchen and living area after deep frying anything.

I decided to prepare our ribs ala dimsum style - steamed - and after some searching, I found this recipe by Weldon Russell posted on Cooking.com that I liked. I found myself missing a few ingredients so I ended up doing some substitutions and eliminating some altogether (I've noted those changes down in the recipe below).

Btw, the ribs were yummy! I really should stage my dishes nicely before taking any photographs. The photo above doesn't do this dish any justice.

Ingredients:

2 tbsp peanut oil (substituted olive oil)

2 tbsp fermented black beans, rinsed under cold water, drained and roughly chopped

1/4 tsp salt

1 tsp sugar

2 tbsp chicken broth

2 tsp rice wine or dry sherry (used cooking sherry)

1 lb pork spareribs, chopped through in sections between the ribs

2 tbsp cornstarch

2 fresh red chili peppers, chopped (did not use)

2 cloves garlic, chopped

2 tbsp chopped cilantro (did not use)

1. Heat the oil in a hot wok. Add the black beans, salt and sugar, and saute gently for 10 seconds. Add the chicken broth, rice wine and light soy sauce. Simmer together for 30 seconds. Remove the sauce to a mixing bowl. Add the spareribs and set aside to marinate for at least 30 minutes.

2. Add the cornstarch and mix well to coat the spareribs. Place the ribs on a plate ready for steaming. Sprinkle on the red chili peppers, garlic and cilantro. Steam over boiling water for 45 minutes.

Baby back ribs and Mushrooms ala Teriyaki (by PinoyCook)

Pinoy Cook's picture of this dish on her Baby back ribs and mushrooms ala Teriyaki post looked so yummy that it made me want to try this recipe out

Given that I have poor planning practices when it comes to food preparation (cooking), I didn't realize that I didn't have all of the ingredients until it was too late.

Instead of gin (in Pinoycook's recipe), I had planned to use mirin which I thought I had. Turned out that I didn't have enough so I added the 1/4 cup remaining mirin that I had and added 3/4 cup of cooking sherry (which was sweet too).

The dish turned out great! I probably should have held off on this (I did this last 12/21) and prepared this for Noche Buena instead. Now, am looking forward to getting invited to the next pot luck party, hubby and I are bringing this :)

Baby Back Ribs

I've been looking for a way to prepare baby back ribs for some time now and I finally found a great recipe at Cantonese Cooking's blog.

The recipe calls for a 2 step process, the first of which is to season the ribs with a rub mixture to flavor the meat.

• Magical BBQ Rub:
  3/4 C. McCormick's Montreal Steak Seasoning
  1 and 1/4 C. brown sugar
  1 oz. paprika
  2 tbl. cayenne pepper (optional)

The ribs are then left in the fridge to chill for at least 4 hours or overnight.

To bake the ribs, wrap them in foil and bake for a few hours using low heat (325 degrees) - The original recipe suggests 3 hours for 3 lbs. When the meat is tender, take them out, drain and then pour your favorite bbq sauce and set to broil. Since we don't keep a bottle of bbq sauce in stock at home, we opted to just make our own using the stuff that we already have - and by that, I am referring to those little packets of catsup and honey that you get from fast food places *smile*.

• Our Special BBQ sauce mix: Mix 4 tbsps (or packets) of honey to 5 tbsps (or packets) catsup, add 1 tbsp soy sauce. Add 1 tbsp of vinegar, 1 tbsp of lemon juice, salt and pepper to taste.

Voila! Granted, our presentation needs a little more work, but the ribs came out beautifully tender and juicy!

* note to self, need more salt.

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Original recipe : Part 1 and Part 2