Ribs With Pasta Salad & Grilled Asparagus
Honestly, I’ve never had bad ribs. I’ve had tough ribs and even dry/slightly overdone ribs, but they’re still good even if they aren’t “fall off the bone” — I hold the same philosophy when we’re talking about bacon. Because you’re cooking a piece of meat with bone(s) attached, you can play around with cooking temperatures as the bone(s) will disperse moisture to the meat as they warm. While yes, low and slow or the 2-1-1 method works great for tender ribs, you don’t have to do it every time. Because I was cooking over natural hardwood, maintaining a specific temperature isn’t as easy as an automatic pellet grill. However, because of the natural smoke and versatile dampers on the PKGO, you can have tender, crowd-pleasing ribs within an hour and a half.
Nicole and I headed up the Poudre Canyon just northwest of Fort Collins to enjoy some beautiful river views and a picnic. We prepped pasta salad and its dressing a few hours before — details below. The pasta salad and grilled asparagus complimented the ribs SO well. When I’m cooking something with BBQ sauce, I enjoy pairing it with a fresh vegetable and something that will offset the sugar or sweetness of the BBQ sauce such as a fresh coleslaw or in this instance, a pasta salad with a vinegar-based dressing.
Head to my Instagram (here) to watch how I made this dish!
Total Time: 2 hours (Prep + Cook Time)
Meal Perks: gluten-free (we used chickpea pasta), affordable, and perfect for camping.
Difficulty: Easy
Ingredients: Pork Rub | BBQ Sauce | Salt and Pepper | 1LB Rotini Pasta | Block of Mild Cheddar | Cucumber | Red Onion | Red Pepper | Green Onion | Extra Virgin Olive oil | Apple Cider Vinegar | Garlic Powder | Onion Powder | Celeary Salt | Italian Seasoning | Asparagus |
How To:
The Ribs
Generously season both sides of your ribs with a pork rub. I went with Sweet Preacher from Fire & Smoke Society. Let them sit overnight or for a minimum of 2 hours. Fire up your grill and try to keep it between 350-400 degrees (I was cooking over natural hardwood). Set the ribs directly on the grates and let cook for an hour. NOTE: Check in a few times to ensure there are no flareups/hotspots on the grill. After an hour, take your Thermapen® ONE and check your internal temperature. Once you have an internal temp of 170, it’s time to add your barbecue sauce. Once sauced, let ribs cook for another 20 minutes or until the internal temp reaches 190-200 degrees.
The Pasta Salad
This dish is always a winner. If you bring this to a party, you’ll be leaving with an empty bowl. For this batch, we used 1LB of gluten-free rotini pasta, 1 cucumber, cubed mild cheddar, 1 red onion, 1 red pepper, green onion, a few dashes of Italian seasoning, and salt and pepper — combine in a bowl and drizzle with oil — gently toss. Cover and keep cold until ready to be eaten.
The Dressing: Combine a 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil with 3/4 cup of apple cider vinegar. Add 1 teaspoon of garlic powder and onion powder, and a 1/4 teaspoon of celery salt to the oil and vinegar mixture. Add salt and pepper to taste. NOTE: Sample your dressing. If it tastes like it’s lacking in any of the ingredients, feel free to modify it.
The Asparagus
We threw these on the grill and sprayed them with some avocado oil and kept it simple: salt and pepper with garlic powder. These only took 15 minutes (we threw them on the grill when we smothered the ribs with bbq sauce) and turned out amazing. I never grilled asparagus before and was totally blown away at how well they absorb the natural smoke — I can’t wait to have them again!
