I love food which is sweet, sticky and spicy and these ribs certainly fulfilled all three of those. I used to love the BBQ ribs in a local restaurant, where the meat used to fall off the bone, but had never really thought of cooking them before. I thought that you probably had to cook the meat for many hours in order to get it so soft and tender, which no doubt put me off.

I had originally thought, when I bought the ribs, that I would put them in the oven in the morning and let them cook until I got home from work. Safety and a couple of recommendations made me try a brisker method, by poaching and then baking. The recipe which I mainly followed only required the meat cook for an hour and 15 mins, which was easier and much more convenient to do.

The recipe I mainly followed was a James Martin recipe, at http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/database/sweetstickyspicyribs_85067.shtml. I can’t remember how much the rack weighed, but it was about the size of a baking tray and only cost a couple of quid. I used half the ingredients suggested for the sauce.

The changes I made to the recipe were to add some fivespice to the poaching water, along with a couple of bay leaves, in addition to the peppercorns, onion and garlic. For the sauce, I didn’t have any fennel seeds, but added celery salt and used nowhere near the amount of ketchup suggested, which is about the amount of an industrial size bottle! A good squeeze of ketchup worked fine, along with a squeeze of tomato paste.

I have to admit the red onion salad did go extremely well with the ribs, cleaning the palate nicely between the messy munching of the meat. I also served a mixed leaf salad with beetroot, which also went well with the ribs.

Whilst the meat didn’t quite fall off the bone, it was so tender  as to not really make much difference. The sweet, sticky, spiciness of the sauce with the tender meat along with the crunchiness of the salads was absolutely delicious. The rack will serve two people with normal appetites or one greedy blogger. Don’t forget to have plenty of kitchen roll spare when you serve up!