Beppe's Ribs

Rib Date: April 11, 2014

Ribsters: Joe Burns, David Crum, Francis Davin, Gregory family, Stults family and Eric Jorgensen as the Beaver

 

If I owned an Italian restaurant, Beppe's Ribs would be on the menu.  You don't normally associate ribs with Italian cuisine, but these ribs, are a staple of the menu at Beppe restaurant in New York City.  

I read the recipe in Steven Raichlen's "Ribs, Ribs, Ribs" book and had fairly low expectations.  They just sounded weird.  Ribs cooked in tomato sauce?  Wacky.  

Wacky perhaps, but delicious definitely.

The ribs are sliced into small racks of three ribs, then seasoned with olive oil, garlic, black pepper,  red pepper flakes, rosemary and sage.  They are then grilled on a standard Webber kettle grill over indirect heat for an hour.  

While that action is going down, a homemade tomato sauce is prepared.  Basically canned whole tomatoes and your standard Italian supplements: EVO, garlic, rosemary, red pepper flakes, white wine, but with some hot sauce to crank it up a notch.  

That all comes together nicely about the time the ribs have cooked for an hour.  The ribs get placed in a tin container and are smothered in the tomato sauce.  The concoction returns to the grill for another hour of cooking over indirect heat.  

That's it.  Simple,  fairly quick (for ribs) and absolutely yummy.

We served the ribs with medley of roasted new potatoes and veggies, which were good, but they would've been even better with risotto or polenta.  We also, in true Italian/Napan fashion, had copious amounts of mostly good wine with Beppe's ribs, where David Crum set the standard with some good stuff from Washington (L'Ecole No. 41 Cab Franc- tasty).

I found Beppe's Ribs to have a nice texture and layers of great flavor.  The chunky tomato sauce delicious and a tad spicy.  Simply excellent.

Some other comments from the crowd:

My sexy sous chef/wife also like Beppe's ribs, saying a bigger pan next time would allow for more even sauce distribution.  Joe concurred, saying the more sauce the better.  Laura Gregory was also a fan, appreciating the "tanginess" of the tomato sauce.

Her hubby Ryan, meanwhile, said he'd only had 10 ribs which was an insufficient amount to develop an opinion.  Must. Keep.  Eating.

Eric thought he tasted smoke, but there wasn't any.  The wine may have kicked in for Eric.  He also appreciated the spice that sneaks up on you at the finish.

Francis said, "Like my wife, they were nice and juicy."  Hmmm...

David Crum said "No comment" then told us how wonderful it is to be vegan and how he will outlive us carnivores while we are going to hell after our short-lived lives.  Cheers!

Conclusion:  However you say "delicious" in Italian is the best one word conclusion for Beppe's ribs.  They'll make a return to our dinner table, that's for sure.

Next: A visit to Guam (a place I've actually visited) with Chamorro Ribs.