Rib Tips with Black Bean Sauce

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Over the 4th of July holiday, I made several racks of pork spare ribs, but the ribs that I had purchased were untrimmed. What that means is that each rack had an edge of cartilage "fingers" protruding from the ribs, otherwise known as rib tips. So I cut off these meaty cartilage sections from the spare ribs and cut them to small bite size pieces to make this dish: rib tips in fermented black bean sauce. The fermented black beans is a Chinese ingredient found in Asian supermarkets, and are salted fermented black soy beans. It gives this dish a nice unique subtle umami flavor.

Tips: The meat that is around the cartilage of these rib tips are quite fatty, so I recommend cooking it down in the black bean sauce and then using a fat separator to remove the fat before thickening the sauce with cornstarch. (My in-laws didn't have a fat separator, so I just made do with a pyrex cup). You can see from the pictures how much fat is rendered off!

Brown the rib tips in a non-stick pan. Then transfer to a large pot
Add water, garlic, black beans, seasonings & simmer for 1.5 hrs
Transfer just the rib tips to a serving container
Pour the cooking liquid to a fat separator (or pyrex cup) and remove the fat
Return liquid to pot and add cornstarch slurry and cook until thickened

Pour sauce over rib tips and serve

6 servings

Ingredients:

  • 3 lbs rib tips cut into bite sized pieces
  • 1.5 T fermented salted black beans, salt rinsed off
  • 3 T soy sauce
  • 1 t salt
  • 6 cloves garlic, chopped
  • 1 t finely chopped ginger
  • 2 t chili paste (less if you don't like spicy)
  • 2 T cooking wine
  • 2 T brown sugar
  • 2 c water

Cornstarch slurry:

  • 2 T cornstarch
  • ¼ c water

Procedures:

1. Brown rib tips in a nonstick pan on at least 2 sides. The more sides that are browned, the better the flavor.

2. Transfer to pot. Add water, garlic, ginger, black beans, salt, soy sauce, brown sugar, cooking wine and chili paste. Give it a good mix.

3. Simmer covered for 1 to 1.5 hours. Check to see when the rib tips are tender but not falling apart.

4. Remove the rib tip pieces to a serving container.

5. Pour the cooking liquid into a fat separator (or large pyrex cup), and separate out the fat. Discard fat. Return cooking liquid to pot.

6. Add the cornstarch slurry little by little and stir over medium heat until the sauce thickens to the desired consistency. You will not need all the cornstarch slurry depending on how much cooking liquid you have after separating out the fat. Pour thickened sauce over the ribs and serve over rice.