While cooking a Pork Butt I decided to smoke a couple of racks of Baby Back Ribs as well. Baby Backs seem to be the favorite pork rib around my table with the family. I put the ribs on a couple of hours into the other cook since they wouldn’t take as long to get done. I have never wrapped my ribs before so now that I have some HardCore Carnivore Peach Butcher Paper I decided to try wrapping one of the racks.
Most of the BBQ cookers I know wrap their ribs in foil but I had never tried wrapping. In my experience with my Pit Barrel Cooker I haven’t needed to wrap to get tender and juicy ribs. For this rib cook I decided to wrap one rack and leave one unwrapped for a little side by side comparison.
Baby Back Rib Prep
I prepared both racks of ribs the same pulling the membranes and rubbing with olive oil. For this cook I used the Bone Suckin Sauce dry rub one both of these Baby Backs. For the wood I used a combination of Hickory and Oak wood chips. I cook my ribs by appearance instead of temperature so I wasn’t quite sure where I was going to wrap one of the racks.
Most of my rib cooks are done in about 3 hours when I get a good pull back of the meat from the bones. So I decided I would wrap one of the racks at 2 hours in. I prefer a wet rib so I baste them with BBQ Sauce when they are done for about 15 minutes to set the sauce.
The unwrapped rack cooked just a bit faster than the wrapped ribs. I sauced them as usual letting the wrapped rack go longer. I pulled the unwrapped ribs off to rest letting the wrapped rack go another five minutes or so. When the wrapped rack was done I unwrapped it and sauced them as I usually do. They ended up taking about 20 minutes longer than the unwrapped baby backs.
Wrapped Vs Unwrapped Baby Back Ribs
The final results were pretty close to call. My wife and I thought the wrapped rack had a better flavor than the unwrapped. But, the unwrapped ribs were super tender. The wrapped ribs were tender but when compared to the unwrapped we had a clear winner. The pictures are of the unwrapped rack of ribs. I took a picture of the racks side by side but it somehow got lost or didn’t actually take.
Will I wrap another rack of ribs based on this comparison? Maybe, the results weren’t an overwhelming win for the wrapped version. Since I don’t normally wrap and unwrapped is much less trouble I’ll probably stick to my normal method. Either way though my PBC turns out great ribs right in my own backyard.
Baby Back Rib Cook Stats
- 2 – Racks of Baby Back Pork Ribs
- Olive Oil
- Bone Suckin’ Sauce Rub
- Hickory and Oak Wood Chips
- Peach Butcher Paper
- Ribs on at 4:15 PM
- Pulled Unwrapped Rack at 7:10 PM
- Pulled Wrapped Rack at 7:30 PM
- Total Cook Time 3 Hours 15 Minutes
