Nutrition information
Here is the nutritional breakdown of ribs, per ounce, according to the North American Meat Processors Association (NAMP) in their superb book "The Meat Buyers Guide: Meat, Lamb, Veal, Pork and Poultry". I have averaged and rounded their data on St. Louis cut and baby backs because the numbers are so similar.
Total calories: 108
Calories from total fat: 76
Total fat: 8.5 grams
Saturated fatty acids: 3.1 grams
Monounsaturated fatty acids: 3.8 grams
Polyunsaturated fatty acids: 0.7 grams
Cholesterol: 33 milligrams
Protein: 7.5 grams
Calcium: 13 milligrams
Iron: 0.46 milligrams
Sodium: 27 milligrams
Zinc: 1.2 milligrams
Riboflavin: 0.8 milligrams
Thiamin: 0.12 milligrams
Let's face it. This is not health food. But ribs tastes soooooo good. The best advice: Eat ribs in moderation. Don't eat ribs every day. Just every other day (grin). And just a half slab. Treat ribs like a treat. Like dessert.
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Party planning
When entertaining, I always cook more than I know I will need. I usually figure one pound per person for a mixed crowd of males and females. Remember, much of that is bone. If it a bunch of big guys are coming over for the game, I'll make more. There will probably be leftovers, but folks love taking my leftover ribs home, and they are great warmed over or even cold. If the crowd is rowdy, I'll just keep the leftovers for myself.
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Pork is not graded
Interestingly, pork is not graded by the USDA as is beef. Beef gets its grades (Prime, Choice, Select, etc.) depending on the amount of fat "marbled" in with the meat. Pork is not graded this way.
Pork grading involves two basic factors. Size and gender of the animal. Some of the terms that are used are:
Butcher Hog. Male or female raised strictly for meat. Weighs 195-320 pounds.
Barrow. Male butcher hog.
Gilt. Female butcher hog.
Sow. Female breeding hog. Weighs 300-700 pounds.
Stag. A castrated male hog. Darker meat. Weighs up to 700 pounds.
Boar. An uncastrated male used for breeding purposes. Darker meat. Weighs up to 1,000 pounds.
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How to get meatier ribs
The best advice I will give you: Develop a relationship with your butcher.
On spare ribs, the amount of meat is determined by nature, all you get is the meat that is on the hog. But because the baby back ribs are cut from the loin meat, the amount of meat on the baby backs is determined by your butcher.
Most grocers and butcher shops get their baby backs pre-cut in boxes, and the amount of meat on the ribs is determined by the price the store feels it can charge, and what the competition forces them to charge.
Even if they get their baby backs pre-cut, many butchers also get whole bone-in rib roasts.
If you ask nicely, your butcher may be willing to custom cut the baby back ribs off the rib roasr leaving extra meat on them. Want baby backs with 1/2" of meat on top? No problem? Want a whole inch? No problem. Expect to pay more for these extra meaty ribs, but the result is worth it.
A better option: Just buy the whole bone-in rib roast and then ask the butcher to remove the baby backs leaving about 1/2" of meat on them. Then keep the de-boned loin meat for roasting separately. Yummmmmm!
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The glass case is filled with baby backs, spare ribs, country ribs, rib tips, riblets, St. Louis cut ribs, rib chops, rib roasts, and more. Just what are the differences between these cuts of ribs? Which are meatier, which are fattier, and which are more expensive? It's hard to tell the players without a scorecard. The USDA specifies the names of some cuts, but others have evolved through common use and local misuse. Here are the facts.
Overview. Pigs have 14 ribs. They are attached to the spine and are usually divied up into four popular cuts: Baby back ribs, spare ribs, St. Louis cut ribs, and rib tips.
Starting at the top are the baby backs, closest to the backbone, nestled beneath the loin muscle. They are curved, round, close together, and most of the meat is on top of the bones, cut from the loin muscle.
As you move further from the spine, the bones get larger, flatter, straighter, and wider apart with more meat between them. There is more fat marbling in the meat as you go further from the spine and closer to the belly. The front ribs are connected to the breast bone with a number of small bones and cartilage known as the rib tips. There are a number of other cuts, and they are all described below.
3 1/2 & down, 4 & over, etc. This is butcher talk for the weight of a slab of spareribs. A "3 1/2 & down" weighs 3.5 pounds or less untrimmed, with the tips attached. Most chefs prefer theirs 3 1/2 and down, from younger hogs.
Applebee's Riblets. See button ribs.
Baby back ribs (a.k.a. back ribs, a.k.a. baby backs, a.k.a. loin back ribs, a.k.a. loin ribs, a.k.a. Canadian back ribs). First of all, let’s get this straight: Baby backs do not come from baby pigs! They are called "babies" because they are shorter than spare ribs. Back ribs are attached to the spine on one end and to the spare ribs on the other. They contain 8-14 bones per slab, and are less fatty than spares. A typical full slab has 11-13 bones. The slab is tapered at one end, with the shortest bones only about 3" and the longest about 6". Because they weigh less than spare ribs, they cook faster. They are usually curved like a hockey stick at the end where they meet the spine, (called the chine side). Depending on how the butcher removes the loin meat that is on the convex side of the baby backs, some can have up to 1/2" of delicate, lean loin meat on the top. Most hungry adults can eat a whole slab of baby backs. Typically $4-8 per pound, and usually about 1.5 to 2 pounds per slab. A single serving is usually half a slab for a lightweight, and a full slab for a hungry person.
Baby front ribs. See photo of Meathead at right pointing out the baby front ribs on an attentive audience member at a recent seminar he gave at the College Football Hall of Fame.
Baby spare ribs. These are not the same as baby back ribs. Nor do they necessarily come from young tender pigs. These are spare ribs made smaller by removing the rib tips. These are more properly called St. Louis cut ribs (see below), but some butchers call them baby spare ribs to capitalize on the popularity of baby back ribs.
Barbecue cut. See St. Louis cut ribs.
BBQ tenders. See flap meat.
Bone-in loin roast or bone-in loin rib roast. See rib roast.
Brisket. In beef, there are two large clods of tough, boneless meet on the chest called brisket. They are used to make corned beef,m pastrami, many pot roasts, and great barbecue. But beef brisket is very differnt than the brisket in pork. In pirk, the brisket is the same as rib tips.
Button ribs (a.k.a. Applebee's riblets). These are technically not ribs. They are a thin, flat strip of meat and round bone, perhaps 1/4" thick, about 6" long, and 1 1/2" wide, cut from the sides of hog's spine behind the rearmost (14th) rib. There are no ribs on the hog there, just little nubs, or "buttons" attached to the backbone. Applebee's restaurants calls this cut riblets, but they are not what had been called riblets in the past. Because Applebee's has made them so popular, they can occasionally be found in stores under the name riblets. See riblets.
Canadian back ribs. Another name for baby back ribs, they are called Canadian because Canadian bacon is made from the loin meat that was connected to the ribs before butchering.
Cheater rack. A nine-bone rack of ribs.
Chef's Bonus. These are the trimmins that, when thrown on the smoker, finish fast and keep the barbecue cook from dieing of starvation during long cooks. See flap and tips.
Chine. The backbone or spine. Sometimes refers to a split backbone, and sometimes refers to backbone still attached to baby back rib slabs and rib roasts. Many people think the chine is the breastbone, but they are on the wrong side of the animal. The confusion is probably because the keel of a boat is often called the chine, and the breast is often called the keel of an animal. But the keel of a boat is analagous to the backbone in that all the ribs are attached to it. In any case, the chine is the spine and not the breast.
Country-style ribs. Country-style ribs are not really ribs. They are cut from the front end of the loin near the shoulder (the shoulder is also known as the "butt" for some strange reason) and a tray in the grocery store can contain contain few, if any, ribs. In fact, if there are bones, they are often part of the shoulder blade. Country-style ribs are more like chops, more meaty and less fatty tham real ribs, and should be treated like chops, not ribs. Because they vary in size and thickness, they are hard to cook to an even doneness. Instead of taking them up to 180F like normal ribs, they should be cooked to 135-140F like chops (see my article "Are they ready yet?"). Typically $3-4 per pound. Depending on how they are cut, a serving will be 1 or 2 country ribs. For big hungry men, pwehaps 3.
Crown roast. See standing rib roast.
Danish ribs. Small slabs of baby backs usually from Denmark, but not always. One guy I know says "I they're possum ribs. They look like baby backs, only smaller, thinner, and meatless!" Never heard a good word about them.
Double wide rib chop. A rib chop that is cut extra manly thick by including two bones. One is usually broken off or cut out. A serving is one chop.
Finger meat. The meat between the ribs.
Flap (a.k.a. skirt, a.k.a. Chef's Bonus). There is a flap of chewy meat from the diaphragm on the concave side of the spare ribs and St. Louis cuts from the head end of the slab. Many cooks remove it and cook it as a snack, toss it in with the tips, or grind it into sausage.
Flat-bone ribs. See button ribs.
Frenching. Getcher mind outta the gutter. Frenching is the trimming butchers do to rib roasts in order to make them look pretty by bearing the rib bones. In the process they will often cut out the wonderful meat between the bones and toss it in the scrap pile for sausage! Arrrrggghhhh! I like to leave the meat on and just cover it with a few layers of heavy foil to keep the bone tips from burning.
Half slab. A slab of ribs cut in half containing 4-6 bones. See slab.
Kansas City cut. Not a commonly accepted term, it is usually used to refer to what is otherwise known as a St. Louis cut. Sounds like a little Missouri rivalry to me.
Kassler rib. Smoked bone-in rib roast.
Loin. The loin of the pig is the long strip of tender, lean meat that runs on either side of the hog's spine and on top of the ribs. It is not the groin area! That is the loins (with an "s") as in "gird ye loins for the battle men." It is usually used in reference to people. One rarely discusses the loins (with an "s") of animals. At least I don't. The tenderloin is a narrow baseball bat shaped muscle that lies just below the loin starting just behind the last rib. The loin and tenderloin are the tenderest and most desireable parts of the pig because they are muscles that doesn't do much work. Because it is the top of the back of the pig, the expression "living high on the hog" came to mean living the lux life. Poor people, serfs, servants, and slaves ate the tougher cuts, the muscles that worked hard, from lower on the hog, such as the ribs.
Loin back ribs or loin ribs. See baby back ribs.
Long end ribs. See short end ribs.
McRib sandwich. Introduced in the early 1980s, the McDonald's McRib sandwich is an oblong ground pork pattie smothered with a ketchupy barbecue sauce, topped with pickle slices and onion slices, served on a kaiser-type roll. The patty is pressed on the top to look as if it has bones in it. I'll never know why they put in the ridges because, with all the sauce, pickles, and onions, even if you took the bun off you'd never notice the corrugations. Of course McRib probably contains no rib meat (too expensive). When I complained to a friend that the name is misleading and it should be changed, he said "Yeah and they oughta change the name of Girl Scout cookies for the same reason." McRib is not always on the menu, a marketing move that creates demand for the sandwich. A friend calls their seasonal appearance "McDonald's answer to soft-shell crabs." McD's even has a humorous website devoted to McRibs called the Boneless Pig Farmers' Association of America! If you try a McRib sandwich, get lots of napkins.
Membrane. Each slab has a meat side and a bone side. The meat side is convex (curving towards you), and the bone side is concave (curving away from you). The bone side has a membrane called the pleura covering it. It can be leathery and almost unchewable when cooked, and it can prevent flavorings and smoke from penetrating. Many butchers remove the skin. If the membrane has not been removed when you bring home a slab, you should remove it yourself. Click here to see how to skin 'n trim.
Middlings. Early American cookbooks refered to spareribs as middlings, presumably because they came from the middle of the hog.
Rack. When referring to pork ribs, a rack is the same as a slab. When referring to lamb ribs, a rack also includes the loin meat and is essentially the same as a rib roast.
Rib chops. These are pork chops cut from the rib roast. They are typically about 3/4" thick, lean, and each has a baby back rib attached. Because they are so lean, they are great for stuffing, and benefit from brining. A normal serving will be one chop. Hungry people might eat two.
Riblets. Riblets are made by taking a full length slab or ribs and cutting them with a cleaver or a band saw so the bones are only half as long as normal, perhaps 2-4". This is done to make smaller portions or to remove part of the curve of baby backs and produce a flatter slab. Usually served as appetizers, for a main course a normal serving would be 10-12 riblets. Some people refer to pork rib tips as riblets. This is incorrect. Applebee's restaurants have a menu item called "riblets" that are technically not riblets. Technically they are button ribs. In veal and lamb, riblets can refer to the ends of the ribs. Then there are the riblets by Gardenburger (at right) described thusly on their website: "Juicy and tender veggie riblets with a slow-cooked, hickory-smoked flavor. And don't forget the smoky BBQ sauce. Cowboys never ate this good." If they did, they would be called soyboys.
Rib roast (a.k.a. bone-in pork loin rib roast, a.k.a. bone-in loin rib roast, a.k.a. center cut rib roast, a.k.a. prime rib of pork). This is the whole pork loin muscle, up to 2' long and 6" thick, with the baby back ribs attached. You can buy the whole roast or sections. Sections of 5-8 bones are typical. The loin meat is lean and tender, so it should be not cooked to the high internal temps as rib slabs. Most sources say the internal temp should be 160F but that's a recipe for cardboard. You can take it off at 135F and let the temp rise to 140F as it rests for about 20 minutes to allow the juices to re-absorb into the meat fibers. Trichinosis is killed at 140F, but not to worry, there are only about 5 cases of trichinosis a year from pork in the US and most of them come from uninspected homegrown hogs. At 140F there will be a hint of pink, and the meat will be moist and juicy. See standing rib roasts. A rib roast can be cut into chops with a bone in each and these are great grilled, especially if brined for an hour first.
Rib tips (a.k.a. brisket, a.k.a. coastal cartilages, a.k.a. breaks). Many people think rib tips and riblets are the same thing. In fact, many websites will tell you they are. They are not. Rib tips are small, meaty pieces that have been cut from the lower ends of the spare ribs when making St. Louis cut ribs. Tips come from near the sternum, breast, and belly. Eating rib tips takes a bit more work than other cuts because the small bone-like cartiladge goes every which way, so there's some gnawing to be done. In addition, tips can be chewy, so many butchers will remove them and chop them for stir-fry or grind them for sausage. In some regions, tips are actually preferred to other cuts, and in other places nobody want them. Go figure. A dozen tips, or one section trimmed from a slab of spares, will fill a normal person. The picture here shows a spare rib and the cartilage from th tips attached. When butchered, the tips are cut at this junction.
Shiners. Rib bones showing through the meat on top of the slab after the slab has been butchered. More common on baby back (loin) ribs than on spare ribs. In the photo at right, the baby backs on the top have been cut generously with extra loin meat left on. The slab below has been cut too close to the bone, leaving two shiners showing on the right.
Short end ribs and long end ribs. In many rib joints you can order a half slab, and you never know which end you'll get. In restaurants in Kansas City you can usually specify the end you want. On a slab of spare ribs, the bones on one end are longer than on the other. The first six ribs from the shoulder back are the long end ribs. The short end has the last seven or eight bones. The short end is slightly meatier and slightly more tender. The short end typically costs $1 more there.
Short ribs. Short ribs are sections of beef ribs, not pork, that are not necessarily short. They are called short because they are cut from the "short plate" which is roughly the same cut as St. Louis cut in pork, from the middle of the side down towards the breast, but not including the breast bones and cartilage, or the ribs connected to the tender and expensive loin meat near the spine. That leaves a section than can be as long as a foot. They are usually taken from the second rib to the 10th rib, and contain 2-5 bones. If you have a good relationship with your butcher, you can order short rib sections with 12" ribs and 18-24" long including as many as 8 bones. The meat is very flavorful but very tough. And it is attached to the bone by a tough, thick layer of connective tissue. Short ribs are usually braised low and slow in liquid, but they can be grilled successfully at low temperatures, especially if tenderized with a blade tenderizer like the Jaccard.
Short ribs come in two cuts: English and flanken. English cut, the most common, has a bone section usually 3" to 5" long, 2-6 bones wide, and is 1-2" thick. They are occasionally available without the bone. Click here for a good recipe for braised beef short ribs. Flanken cut is less common, but popular in Asian butcher shops. Flanken ribs are typically about 6" long, 1" wide, and 1 -1.5" thick. They are cut across the grain so there are several connected rib bones sections, each about 1/2" or less long. Korean bulgogi and kalbi are popular recipes for thinly sliced, marinated, and grilled short ribs, flanken cut.
Side ribs. See spare ribs.
Skin. Another name for the membrane, this "skin" is from the inside of the rib cage. Real skin is from the exterior of the pig. See membrane.
Skirt meat. See flap.
Slab. A slab is a row or ribs held together by muscle meat, fat, and cartilage. The meat is both between the bones and on top of them. A slab is usually 9-13 bones, depending on how it is trimmed. A half slab is a slab cut in half. Doh!
Spare ribs (a.k.a. spares, a.k.a. side ribs). Spare ribs are not like spare tires. They are not extras, leftovers, or an inferior cut. Nor are they so named because the meat is scanty. They contain excellent meat. Many chefs prefer spares to baby back ribs.
Spares come from further down the side than baby back ribs and there is more bone than meat in a slab of them. USDA says a slab must have at least 11 bones. They are also straighter and flatter than baby backs. The bones, connective tissue, and the fat make them very flavorful.
Look at a slab of spare ribs and you will notice that along one edge the ends of bones are showing and you can see marrow (the left side in the photo at right). This is where they were cut from the baby backs. The other end, with no bones sticking out, is a gristly flap from the sternum to the belly side, called rib tips. In the photo you can see the place where the tips join the ribs on the underside of a slab of spares. The bone side of spare ribs usually has a meaty flap that is part of the diaphragm called the flap meat. It has been removed in the photo.
So how did spareribs get their name? According to Charles Perry of the Los Angeles Times, "In 17th century England, spareribs were also called spear-ribs or even ribspare, a clear tipoff that this wasn't a native English word. It was borrowed from the German rippespeer, which is smoked pork loin."
Spares are a little less expensive than baby back ribs because they have more bone. The price difference is also because demand for baby backs has grown significantly since a chain restaurant began promoting them (sing along with me now "I want my baby back baby back baby back ribs"). Spareribs are typically $2-6 per pound, they generally run 4-5 pounds and can usually feed two people. Top chefs prefer spares from smaller, younger hogs, 3 1/2 & down, or less than 3 1/2 pounds.
St. Louis cut ribs (a.k.a. SLC a.k.a. barbecue cut, a.k.a. Kansas City cut). Lop the rib tips and the flap meat off a slab of spare ribs, and what remains is a flat rectangular slab called the St. Louis cut. Many experts like the taste of the St. Louis cut even better than the more expensive baby back ribs because there is more meat between the bones, and it is better marbled. Because the 11-13 rib bones are straight and flat, they are the best cut for recipes that require the ribs to be browned in a frying pan on the stovetop. If your butcher doesn't know what St. Louis cut means, get a new butcher or simply ask for spare ribs with the rib tips removed. Then again, you may want to remove them yourself. Typically $3-7 per pound, a standard 3-3.5 pound slab can serve two people or one really hungry big man. The picture at right is a half-slab of SLC at Super Smokers in St. Louis.
Standing rib roasts (a.k.a. crown roast). There are two ways to make this festive meal for a crowd. The traditional method is to take a rib roast and bend it into a circle with the loin meat in the center and the bones facing out. The cavity this creates is often filled with a bread stuffing or even pork sausage meat. A more recent variation on the theme is made with a slab of baby back ribs wrapped around a hunk of loin meat (shown here). When the meat between the bones is trimmed out it is called Frenching. Depending on how it is trimmed, there's usually enough meat for at least 10 people.
Tips. See rib tips.
More info
Click here for other barbecue glossary terms important to the barbecue cook.
Click here to view a site from the University of Nebraska Lincoln that has some really helpful pix and a really cool 3D visualization of a hog carcass and from where the differnet cuts come. Here is their site for beef.
Click here to see Title 9, Volume 2 of the Code of Federal Regulations. It contains the official government definitions for all cuts of meat.
Click here to see the US Department of Agriculture's (USDA) Institutional Meat Purchasing Specifications (IMPS). This 40 page brochure in pdf format is the official source.
Click here to see The Revised USDA Nutrient Data Set for Fresh Pork June 2006. This 25 page pdf document includes tables for most major cuts of pork and their nutrient contents including calories, protein, water, carbs, fiber, sugars, sodium, cholesterol, etc.
This page revised 4/14/08
