Jalapeño Poppers Get a Smoky Pulled Rib Makeover on the Yoder Smokers YS640s

Hey everybody, I'm Chef Tom with atbbq.com and this is pulled rib poppers. Today we're gonna take a half rack of spare ribs, smoke them up, shred them up, and then put them on top of jalapeno poppers. Now I was gonna do pulled pork originally, which I would normally use a pork butt for, but the grocery store didn't have pork butts, so we pivoted, and honestly, it might be better. So like I said, a half rack of ribs. This is gonna get you a good at least 12, maybe 16 poppers, depending on the size of them. They're first gonna get a little bit of a bath in our pit fire hot sauce. Just add a little bit of vinegar twang to the base. And then we're gonna hit it with two different seasonings. I'm starting with the jerk from Plowboys. So this is gonna have like a Jamaican jerk feel to it. You're gonna get some of those warming spices. But honestly, just makes it a little bit more interesting. On top of that, we're gonna add the Lone Star brisket rub from Cattleman's Grill. This is a bit chunkier. It's mostly just, I mean, it is entirely just salt, pepper, garlic, and celery seed. So you're getting a little bit of extra saltiness out of that. Haven't done much to these ribs as far as trimming goes, just taking the membrane off the backside. We get them fully seasoned up, and they're ready to go on the smoker. Smoking these ribs on the Yoder Smokers YS640S Pellet Grill. We're doing them hot and fast today at 300 degrees. Now right next to it, you can see the rack that's been on already for three hours. It's got some great color on it. This is the other half of that rack. This is ready to wrap, so that's what we're gonna do now. So we're gonna place this meat side down, bone side up. That way the meat can kind of braise in its own juices as it cooks. Wrap it up tight in two sheets of foil to make sure nothing pokes out, and then back onto the smoker until it's just falling apart tender. Another couple hours. So here's a finished rack from earlier today. You can see that the meat has completely pulled away from these bones. They just slide right out of there, which is what we're looking for, because we're gonna get this meat and shred it up. Normally I wouldn't cook ribs this far, but I want them to be fully shreddable. When I cook them on the bone and I'm gonna eat them on the bone, I want them to stay on the bone until I take a bite, but in this case I want them sliding right off the bone so that we can just shred these up. We're gonna pick out any bits of cartilage from the rib tips, and these are gonna be ready to go on top of our poppers. Now let's get into jalapenos. So we're gonna start by just splitting these and then scraping out the seeds. There's a lot of tools for this out there, but honestly just throw on a pair of gloves so you don't hurt yourself later, and then scrape them right out. It's the quickest and easiest way in my opinion. Now we've got a great little vessel to hold some cream cheese, and then we're gonna pile rib meat on top. So now we're just gonna go straight cream cheese in each one of these. We'll make it about even, about level with the top. So key teaching point here, if it's not obvious already, make sure that this cream cheese is room temp because it makes it super easy to spread. So now we're gonna hit each one of these with some of our smoked rib meat. The great thing here is even though these ribs are fully cooked, they're now sitting in a pool of cream cheese, which is gonna help keep them moist over the next like 40 minutes or so as we soften up the jalapenos. And just to make sure, we're gonna put some more cheddar cheese on top. Hit the top with some shredded, this is sharp white cheddar cheese. I'm just gonna let that melt over the top. Now back onto the yoder, this time at 425 degrees just to warm up the cheeses and to kind of start to break down the jalapenos. Been about 30 minutes now. These are looking really good. Cheeses are fully melted. Just doing the squeeze test. Those jalapenos still have a little bit of rigidity to them, but they've softened up enough. I think they're in the perfect spot. Let's get these plated up now. Big, beautiful platter full of jalapeno poppers. It's gonna be great for your summertime cookouts. I'm gonna pair these creamy, spicy, salty delights with a sourish Tar Heel Tang barbecue sauce, a Carolina-style sauce. And to compliment that and just to make things look a little bit prettier, we're gonna put some of our Coslick's Triple Crunch on top, pickled mustard seeds. Now for the taste. I love the tang with the creaminess of the cream cheese. That pork gives it fantastic texture. The jalapeno's just where it needs to be. And of course, all the cheesiness. Triple Crunch, one of my favorites. This thing's all over the place, but I wouldn't change a thing. Thank you so much for watching. Be sure to check out atbbq.com for all the products featured in today's video. If you enjoy the recipe, hit that subscribe button. And if you have any questions or comments or there's anything you'd like to see me cook, let me know in the comments section down below and let's be good to one another. For more recipes, tips, and techniques, head over to atbbq.com slash the sauce. All Things Barbecue, where barbecue legends are made.