I Am the BBQ Master

Last night Todd and I hosted a little cookout at the beach down the street from our house. I decided, to appease my friend Charlie's extraordinarily carnivorous sister Amber, to make ribs. I ordered up several slabs on spare ribs from my local butcher (Bornhofen's in Edgewater, highly recommended for all of your meat needs) and adapted a spice rub recipe from Food Network nerd idol Alton Brown. I let this sit (in the fridge, people, don't worry) for about 6 hours, while Todd put together the Napa grill. Not like Napa wine country. Like Napa Auto Parts.

(Here's the story... Todd's brother-in-law works for Napa and got two of these promotional grills that look like cars, complete with wheels and fins. We were lucky enough to get one of these grills for Christmas. This thing got more attention than the XL girl in the S bikini. Other grillers actually came over to compliment us multiple times.)

So anyway we got the grill set up, we got the coals on the grill, we got the ribs on the grill (ok, another digression. I know that what we did is not technically barbecue, and thus I am not technically the BBQ master. Otherwise, the bottoms of the ribs wouldn't have been burned. But back to the tale.) our friends showed up (bearing fruit and veggies) and joined in the adoration of the meat. Because let me tell you, this is was some beautiful meat. Red and glistening and crispy and tender and luscious. And delicious. And the sauce that I brought was entirely unnecessary. I've never really made ribs before, but I have a knack, apparently. Quoth the dad at the Father's Day cookout next to us: "Girl, you could sell those!" And if my publishing career doesn't pan out, I just might.

Here's my rub recipe, for those of you who might like to give this a try:

12 tbs brown sugar
2 1/2 tbs table salt
1 1/2 tbs chili powder
1 tsp black pepper
1 tsp cayenne
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp oregano

Happy summer, everybody.