Hello! It’s been a long time coming and I am finally writing a guest blog entry for BB! My name is Ron and if you have been following BB’s blog, you’ll find a mention of my adventures with her every now and then. And since this is my first post, I figure I should follow protocol and say a little about myself.
I grew up in Southern California, mainly in and around Los Angeles County. My family owned a restaurant for a few years, then focused on catering, and eventually left the food industry for good. However, the cooking continued at home where I spent almost every weeknight and most weekends hovering over my mom’s and auntie’s shoulders to get a peek at what they were cooking and how they did it. Eventually, my interest with food (and my family’s experience in the restaurant business) merged with my academic research. And that’s how I ended up in New England in a graduate program where I met BB.
(Sidenote from BB: Ron studies food history and restauranteuring…cool, right?! And yes, I moved all the way from California to the East Coast just to date another Californian. You can take the girl out of California, but you can’t take the California out of the girl!!)
Now, on to business. BB and I threw around the idea of making ribs this past week, and upon shopping for some bread and sparkling water at the local market, we came across a two and a half pound slab of pork spareribs for a little over eight dollars. Sold! Back at my place, I searched for “oven baked pork spareribs” and among the usual recipe websites that Google generates, Smitten Kitchen’s Sweet and Smoky Oven Spareribs caught my attention. I tried the recipe (with a few of my own additions) and wow! That’s a great oven sparerib!
These easy Oven Spareribs are sweet, smoky, and spicy. The sweetness comes from the brown sugar, while the smoky and spicy flavors come from the ginger, cumin, paprika, and chili powder. The cooking is a cinch, too: wrap them in tin-foil, stick them in the oven on a low heat for some hours, and you’re done! And they came out wonderfully tender. I used SK’s recipe with a few additions and changes as follows:
