
Recipe: Smoking Perfect Ribs on a Pellet Grill
Published: June 07, 2022Ribs are one of my favorite things to smoke on my Traeger Pellet Grill, because once you season them up and get them on the smoker all you have to do is wait. I don't even wrap them or stick a thermometer in them.
They are that easy. And super good.
Time
Prep Time | 30 minutes |
Cook Time | 5 hours or so, could be a little more or a little less |
Rest Time | 7-10 minutes |
Total Time | 5 hours and 40 minutes |
Ingredients
- One or more racks of ribs, I prefer Baby Back Ribs
- I have used St. Louis Ribs, and they came out good, but you have to reduce the cook time by up to an hour.
- Yellow Mustard (binder)
- Rub - I generally use "The BBQ Rub" or Mississippi Grind
- Pellets - I generally use Pecan, but also have used an assortment successfully.
What you need to do:
1. Picking the Ribs
In general when I smoke ribs on the Pellet Grill I generally use Baby Back ribs, because I find that they have good amount meat, they come out tender, and don't have big bones.
I usually get mine from where ever we are Costco? Walmart? Whole Foods? The Local super market? You want to get a good quality rack, not too much fat, but some.
You can use St. Louis style ribs, but I find that the bones are bigger, and the resulting meat is less than what you get on a baby back.


2. Trim the ribs
For this step there are two primary things that need to be done.
1. Trim off any excess fat or meat. You want you ribs to cook evenly, and any excess fat or meat will not cook at same speed as the rest of the rib rack (you can save this for later if you would like)
2. The last step is to remove the silver skin from the backside of the rib. This is optional, sometimes it comes off easily and sometimes it doesn't I usually don't stress about it. To remove it find a part of it that is not connected to the meat, and grab it with a paper towel and pull, you may need to do this more than once.
3. Season the Ribs
We use mustard as a binder, this can be any mustard, plain old yellow mustard works just fine. Once we spread it around we add our seasoning, I prefer seasoning that are a little spicy and have some color to them, I think the end result looks much better. Some favorites are The BBQ Seasoning and Swine Life Mississippi Grind

4. Warm up the Smoker
Time to warm up the grill. I usually do this after seasoning the Ribs, because it is best if the ribs have to rest and absorb the seasoning, the end result turns out much better.
For this step you want to get your smoker to 250 degrees. For pellets I usually use Pecan, but have used apple, cherry, and mixes.
5. Put the ribs on the Smoker
For this step I usually put the ribs on the top grate, I find that it allows the smoke to really penetrate the meat, plus heat rises and it is further from the flame or fire box, which results in a more even cook.

6. Initial Cook is for about 3 hours.
For this step all you have to do is set a timer for 3 hours and go check the ribs. They should be coming along nicely at this point, the bark is barely forming.
7. Check again...they should be ready or very close
At this point it is two hours since your last check, or roughly 5 total hours in the smoke. The ribs should have a good bark on them and the meat should be pulling away from the bone.
Also when you lift the ribs in the middle the ends should fold down and still touch the grate. Or the meat will separate at the lift point. If that is happening then that rack is done.
Another way to check is if the rib bone can move kind of freely in the meat.


8. Done
This is the step we have all been waiting for. The ribs are done, they need to be pulled off the grill. At this point I also let me rest for 7-10 minutes, it let's them finish cooking a bit, get a little cooler, and suck all of the juices back into the meat.
Best and easiest way to cut the ribs is to flip it over so that it is bone side up and cut between the bones to serve.
Serving instructions, I almost always cook the ribs with Dry Rub because not everybody likes BBQ sauce on ribs. So I toss them to order, which great because you can handle different sauces, and different heat levels of the sauce.
Now Enjoy your hard work and amaze your friends.