BBQ Ribs Recipe

BBQ ribs are one of my favourite meats for the braai (barbeque), coated in a thick tasty sauce and served with sadza (pap). The meat is usually much cheaper than steak, best eaten with the hands and so is perfect if you are having a bunch of kids around (big or small!)

Pork BBQ Ribs
The trick to great pork ribs on the barbecue is the thick sweet sauce, I mostly use honey to add sweetness and for the texture, it is important not to put it on too soon or it will burn, turning your bbq ribs into charcoal!

Ok lets get started on this recipe for Pork BBQ Ribs:

BBQ Pork Ribs Recipe

A simple to make bbq ribs recipe for pork, with a marinade that is later used as the source for the ribs, there are no specific quantities for the recipe as most of it will be personal preference… typical man barbeque recipe then!

BBQ Ribs ingredients (Serves 4)

• 1.8 kg (4 lbs) of thick and meaty pork belly ribs
• bbq sauce (your own or comercial version)
• Tomato Sauce (ketchup)
• Worcestershire sauce
• Red wine
• Honey
• Rosemary (fresh)
• Oregano flakes
• Salt & pepper to taste
• Flour or corn starch

To make the marinade for the BBQ Ribs:

To make the marinade for the ribs, use a non-metal container, some people also use a plactic bag and place the ribs into the container. Add the fresh rosemary, oregano and pepper. Then add plenty of honey, your barbeque sauce, tomato sauce and Worcestershire sauce.

Make sure the ribs are completely smothered in your marinade, then carefully add the red wine, making sure not to remove the coating on your ribs (pour the wine into the corners of your container). Add enough wine to cover most of the ribs then place in the fridge and leave to marinate overnight.

Barbecue the Ribs

I wont tell you how to make a good braai (barbecue) here, but it is important to make sure you have enough coals- without flames, as pork takes longer to cook than beef. Cook the ribs, salting and seasoning them a few times as you turn them make sure you turn them often enough so as not to burn them. A few minutes before the bbq ribs are done, pour some more honey over them, allowing it to melt.

Make the BBQ Sauce for the Ribs

Whilst the bbq ribs are cooking add your saved marinade sauce to a pan, add 2 or 3 teaspoons of flour or cornstarch to thicken the sauce. Bring the marinade mixture to a boil, season to taste with salt and pepper, checking the thickness, you can add more flour that has been dissolved in warm water to prevent lumps. Make sure to simmer your sauce for at least 5-10 minutes to get rid of that uncooked flour taste.

That’s it, serve the bbq ribs with the sauce in a separate bowl and some traditional Zimbabwean sadza on the side.

Chakalaka is a spicy African vegetable relish traditionally served with bread, sadza (pap), samp, stews or curries and origionally comes from the townships of Johannesburg.

Chakalaka Ingredients:

• 45 ml oil
• 1 onion
• 2 garlic cloves grated
• 1 green pepper (crushed)
• 3 green chillies deseeded and finely chopped
• 10 ml curry powder
• 3 medium carrots, grated
• 1 medium cauliflower or broccoli, divided into florets
• Can of baked beans in tomato sauce
• Salt and pepper to taste

Method:
Heat oil and sauté onions, garlic, ginger and green pepper with the chillies and curry powder for five minutes. Add carrots and cauliflower. Cook gently for about 15 minutes, or until all vegetables are cooked. Add beans and seasoning, heat through and allow to cool. Serve cold.

What has happened to Chirundu.com?
The original Chirundu.com (1.0) began life over 12 years ago as a database for the many Zimbabweans and other Africans living abroad. It was a way for all of us to keep in contact with our friends and family scattered around the globe.

I designed and built it long before the likes of Facebook were even thought of and am very proud of the fact that we had an active base of over 20 000 members.

Now that the new global social networking sites like Facebook are here with their many millions of members including most of the Zimbabweans who were on Chirundu.com, our database became much less important to the Zimbabwean community than it once was. On top of this I felt that it was pointless having your details duplicated on more than one website and so have decided to stop running Chirundu.com as a contacts database.

So is Chirundu.com now dead?
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What is Next for Chirundu.com?
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You can write about about anything to do with Zimbabwe, without being overly negative, abusive or hurtful. Do you have an old favourite African recipe that you’d like to share, or do you run a Zimbabwean business, either still in Zim or overseas and would like to write about it? How about some old memories and photos that you’d like to share. Or how about writing about some of our unique and interesting history?

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All the best and I look forward to hearing from you,

Chirundu Jason