SMOKING HOT SUMMER

LOW and slow. The art of American barbecue, where cheaper joints of meat such as ribs, brisket and shoulder of pork are hot-smoked over indirect heat and gradually transformed into soft, smoke-scented magnificence… Down in the American south and south east, it’s more religion than a mere technique. A decade back, there was no more than a handful of ‘que’ restaurants over here. And home smoking was for expats only. Now, you can barely move for second-rate pulled pork, and desiccated racks of ribs.

Luckily, there’s a wide range of home smokers on the market to enable you to have a true taste of the barbecue belt.

The key is maintaining a constant temperature of about 110 to 125C, over a long period.

I tested all those featured with baby back ribs (from the everreliable donaldrussell.com), and marinated them for five hours in a dry rub (there are endless recipes online, plus lots of pre-mixed ones to buy. I like Butt Rub, from Amazon). They were smoked, naked, for three hours, basted with apple juice, then cooked for a further two hours while wrapped in foil. Finally, a decent barbecue sauce was slathered on every 15 minutes for an hour.

The end result should not fall apart, but have a good, firm texture – meat that comes off the bone with the minimum of bite. Better still is the smoke ring, a pinkish tinge to the meat that shows the smoke has truly penetrated. Acquire that blessed ring and you’ve mastered the art.