Pomegranate Chipotle Mop Sauce

If you've been following the blog for a while, you'll recognize this as the same basic recipe as the sauce for Pomegranate Chipotle Slow-Cooker Pork, but it's been revamped a little to become a mop sauce for grilling.


1 16-oz bottle pomegranate juice (plain, no other flavors added)
1 small can mangoes, in their own juice (if you have fresh mangoes, even better. Slice them up, and add 1/2 can mango nectar)
2 chipotle peppers with a heaping spoonful of the adobo sauce
1 large onion, rough chopped
2 cloves garlic
1 pinch allspice
1/4 cup apple cider vinegar
2 heaping tbsp dark molasses
3-4 tsp salt, or to taste

• Place the mangoes, onion, garlic, and peppers in a blender or food processor and blend until almost smooth
  
• Whisk the mango mixture together in a large saucepan with remaining ingredients. Bring to a boil.
• Continue boiling over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until reduced by half
• Mop onto meat or vegetables within the last 5-10 minutes of grilling
  

I used this tonight on ribs and it was absolutely heaven! Here's what I did:

• Rubbed a few racks of ribs with Michael Chiarello's Cocoa Spice Rub and popped them into the fridge while the grill was heating.
• Turned on the outer two burners of the grill only, and oiled the surface in the center of the grill (the burner underneath was turned off. This way, the ribs will cook with indirect heat.)
• Once the grill was hot (about 300°), I placed the ribs in the center of the grill, bone down.
  
• Flipped the ribs occasionally.
  
• Brushed the ribs every 1/2 hour or so with tonic water. This keeps the rub from drying out, and when the ribs are bone-up, you'll get a little puddle of the tonic water that helps keep the air moist as it evaporates.
• When the meat pulls easily from the bone (about 2 hours), mop each side with sauce, grill for a few minutes, then mop again. Repeat until you get a good coating of sauce on all sides.
• Just before removing from the grill, mop one last time with a pretty healthy serving of sauce, so your ribs are nice and slathered. The combo of the rub and the sauce couldn't be better. This was probably one of the best meals I've eaten in a long time!