Yesterday’s dinner was a raging success! We smoked the ribs for about 8 hours. About half way in, the coals were burnt down, and needed replenishing. More hickory chips were added at this point, and the water pan refilled. We took this time to move the upper rack of ribs to the lower position, and the lower to the upper. Mopping continued. While continuing to smoke, biscuits and honey butter were made, the salad created and a complementary vinaigrette. The beans continued to cook in a very slow oven until it came time to up the heat for the biscuits.
Baked Beans
1 lb. small white beans or navy beans
2/3 c. maple syrup, dark amber
1 onion, diced fine
6 strips thick cut bacon, chopped into 1 inch pieces
2 T. brown sugar
1 tsp. fresh ground black pepper
1/4 c. ketchup
pinch salt
water
Soak beans overnight. Rinse, pick through. Put into ovenproof Dutch oven with lid, Add all the rest of the ingredients, and enough water to cover the beans by about an inch. Mix it all together. Place in oven, bake at 350 for about 4 hours. Check periodically to ensure adequate liquid in pot to prevent burning. Drop temperature to 300 to continue cooking, or to keep warm until dinner time (if you don’t need the oven for something else!). Beans should be firm, but tender. You can also cook them ahead of time, and warm them up on the stove top.
Honey Butter
1/2 lb. sweet butter
1/4 c. honey
pinch sweet cinnamon
1/4 t. vanillaLet butter come to room temperature. Beat in other ingredients until well blended. Butter will be rather soft. Return to refrigerator to chill. Serve on biscuits, or use on toast, or whatever needs it.
Subtle use of the cinnamon and vanilla will enhance the delicacy of the honey – I used orange blossom from a local farmer – too much will overwhelm the honey.
Buttermilk Biscuits
3 c. flour (I used King Arthur unbleached white)
1/2 lb (2 sticks) cold, sweet butter
2 T. baking powder
2 T. sugar
1 1/2 c. buttermilk
pinch salt
gourmet sea salt (optional)Preheat oven to 425 F. Line large cookie sheet with parchment paper.
Combine pinch salt, sugar, powder and flour together in a large bowl. Cut butter into flour mixture until it resembles coarse meal. Pour in buttermilk, stir together briefly with fork until liquid incorporated. Turn out onto floured board and knead 10 times until smooth. Roll out to about 1/2-3/4 inch in height. Cut biscuits with 2-3″ cutter, or use a tumbler dipped in flour. Be efficient in cutting your biscuits to get the most use out of dough. Reshape leftover dough into ball, roll out again, and cut more biscuits. Repeat as necessary.
Place biscuits on cookie sheet. Brush milk or cream onto tops. If you want, sprinkle gourmet sea salt on top of biscuits – this is a nice counterpoint in taste to the honey butter.
Bake 12-15 minutes; cool on wire rack, or place in towel-lined bowl and bring to table for serving. Yield – 12-15 biscuits, depending on thickness of rolled dough.
Altogether, it took a couple of days to put this meal together, but the actual labor was not a lot.
Beans are easiest to soak overnight, but you can also do a quick soak method by cooking them about an hour before baking them. I cooked them Friday night for a few hours, and then finished them off on Saturday.
Our baby back ribs were frozen, so we took them out of the freezer, still wrapped, to defrost, and on the morning before smoking began, we put the rub on them. That was on Friday morning for the Saturday morning smoking. We started smoking around 9, and ended at 5 that evening.
Biscuits and honey butter took very little time. I made the honey butter a few hours before dinner so it could chill and become a bit more solid before dinner. The biscuits I started about an hour before serving, as prep time needed to be considered. I use a pastry cutter for the cutting, or sometimes just my fingers, rubbing the chilly butter into the flour. 
We had leftovers – some biscuits, honey butter, some beans, and some ribs. More than enough for us four, but if you have voracious eaters, consider upping the amounts. Home brew (from another brew day) was enjoyed before, during, and after dinner.
Oh, forgot to add – we had root beer floats for dessert (but I would have preferred a black cow myself!).
Ink, Yarn & Beer 