4 Ingredient Challenge…. Smoked Beer Braised Short Ribs on a bed of Celery, Glazed with Peaches over Gluten Free Pasta

 

Sometimes life can throw us some curve balls.

I am involved in the On Our Grills 4 Ingredient Challenge that a bunch of food bloggers partake in every month and this month the challenge is to incorporate 4 ingredients into a recipe.

The Challenge for me though was to write this post. I had it all set to go hours of writing and uploading of pics and all I had to do was click my mouse on the post button and…………..

FAILURE!!!!!

WordPress gives me an error message and I lose everything except for the title.

So I am going to rush through this as fast as I can, I hope I do not make to many mistakes.

Here goes……

This months challenge is to use these 4 ingredients in a single recipe and hope that it turns out to be both edible and appealing.

• Short Ribs (also known as Brazing ribs or Beef Chuck Ribs)
• Celery
• Peaches
• Gluten Free Pasta

I had a deadline of Monday August 22 at 11am Eastern Time to post this recipe and I waited till the last minute to get the ingredients which I thought would be easy but I hit Walmart on Friday and no Short Ribs, So I visit my Butcher at Kyles Meats and he did not have any but said I can order for the next week, and of course that would just not do.

Next stop was Halenda’s Meats and my local store was out of stock but the gal behind the counter was kind enough to phone the store in the north end and low & behold they had 6 racks left but I had to get in my car and make it in the door before they close, well I made it with 10 minutes to spare Phew!

Saturday morning I seasoned them with a great Steak rub called Pride of SZEGED (I love the aroma this seasoning creates!) and let that marinate for a couple of hours in the fridge.

But how would I cook the short ribs? and how to incorporate Celery into the mix, after talking with my friend Joe that tags along to many of the Ribfests  and Restaurant reviews that I do for my blog he gave me a suggestion that I liked and ran with.

I grabbed a foil pan and in the bottom of that pan I placed some sliced onions and some sticks of celery to make a bridge for the meat to rest on while it is both smoked and steamed at the same time a mixture of Beer and water that almost covers the celery but not quite.

Hey now this may just work!, into the Masterbuilt Electric Smokehouse it goes with it set to its maximum smoking temperature of 275F programmed to cook for 4 hours.

Now what wood will I choose to use for the smoke? then it hit me!

When I went to Florida for my Southern Expedition last January I visited my friend Michael Baxter of Baxter’s Premium Smoking Wood and he had given me a bag of Peach Wood Sawdust…. Perfect!

One thing I have found with my Masterbuilt Smoker is that it tends to burn sawdust better than woodchips giving me a better smoke.

 

After about 3 hours it was time to make a Peach Sauce for the top of the short ribs this is what I came up with.

I took 3 fresh peaches and skinned and chopped them into a bowl and to them added some Maple Syrup (of which I only had a bit left) and some Sweet Life Screamin’ Peaches Hot Sauce out of Florida that I just adore, I use that on everything including nachos and even Mac & Cheese.

But since I did not have enough Maple syrup so I added a  1/4 cup of Brown sugar to achieve what i hoped would be some sweet heat!

After a quick blend I cooked the sauce in a cast iron skillet on the gas BBQ for about an hour simmering away.

My plan was to serve this at my friends Bob and Susan’s house for dinner so I wrapped it all in foil and kept it in my smoker dropped down to 200F for a half hour while I cleaned up.

As far as the Pasta goes I also had trouble finding that too so I called Susan since she has to eat Gluten free products and she suggested that the Bulk Barn sold Gluten Free Pasta so I drove there and sure enough they had 3 kinds in stock, so I grabbed a bag and brought it with me to Bob and Susan’s, where she was kind enough to throw a pot of water on her stove and cook it for me.

Susan explained to me that Gluten free Pasta cooks differently than regular pasta does, first of all it makes the water turn milky to where it is almost a soup and you have to constantly stir it otherwise it will stick to the bottom of the pot.

After taking the foil off the ribs this is how it looked.

Now it was time to plate it up and serve!

The ribs could be eaten off the bone or sliced away from the bones which in this plate you can see I served it both ways.

How was it you ask? We loved it!, the Peach glaze I made was a wonderful addition to the smoke meat and even though Bob & Susan did not sense the heat from the Hot Sauce I did, but maybe I should of doubled the Screamin’ Peaches amount that I used.

The pasta does have a different texture than regular pasta but it still was a nice side for the meat, which was tender and had a great bark on it with the peach smoke taste which worked real well.

I did not take a picture of it but when I had seconds I drizzled some Horn Dawgs Smokin BBQ Sauce on it and the combination of the peach glaze and the sweet BBQ sauce added even more of a flavour explosion in my mouth. I will be reviewing the Horn Dawgs Sauce in a future post.

Now I am not the only contributor to the 4 Ingredient Challenge, please check out my friends posts that entered this months challenge.

Marc Van Der Wouw of Grill Adventure – ENTRY HERE

Grilladventures by broadcastmarc is started on March of 2010.I started the BBQ thing when I was 30, before that we eat a lot outside have fun, but when the kids came in our life We start serious cooking. Most of it is really healthy I think;-) The grill has a special place in my heart, We love to do things outside.. Everything I make is an adventure, and sometimes we use the books. We try to grill as much as we can year round.

Hanneke “The Dutchess Cooks” ENTRY HERE

After years of cooking, grilling, baking and reading other people’s blogs, I thought “why not start my own blog??” And I did, in 2010, but already after a short period of time, a blog wasn’t enough, and I started my own website. It’s not my goal to publish or come up with fancy and difficult recipes: just good and delicious food with an international twist! Straight from my plate to yours!

Chris from Nibble me this ENTRY HERE

The Nibble Me This website was created to share Chris’ misadventures in live fire cooking. ”I have no culinary training….I’m just entertaining myself with fire and food”.

Larry from the BBQGrail ENTRY HERE

The BBQ Grail website was created in 2007, initially to document the author’s quest to find the perfect backyard BBQ experience. Since that time The BBQ Grail has become one of the more popular BBQ blogs on the internet and is listed on Alltop.com as one of the top BBQ blogs.

Paul Height from No excuses bbq ENTRY HERE

The No Excuses BBQ website was started in January of 2009 as a way to record the author’s goal of cooking outdoors at least once a week throughout the year and showing the results to the world. Somewhere along the way things got out of control…

Jason from “JasonsBBQAdventures” ENTRY HERE
And our newest contributor is….
Kristina from “The Daily Dish” ENTRY HERE

Kristina has been writing “The Daily Dish” for www.BetterRecipes.com for the past two years. The blog covers a wide variety of recipes, but firing up the grill truly lights up her passion for food! She was named “America’s Next Pork Personality” by Guy Fieri for one of her grilled pork dishes, won the outdoor grilling division of the National Beef Cook-Off, and her winning grilled lamb-burger took her all the way to the land Down Under with Meat and Livestock Australia. The “4-Ingredient Challenge” is a fun and exciting way to get creative on the grill!

You can also follow and like Kristina here.
Blog: http://www.betterrecipes.com/blogs/daily-dish

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