A happy post

So, I woke up this morning and found that everything had successfully backed up to my external hard drive. So, I restarted the computer, only I missed my window of time to boot from the Vista disk because I was distracted by the news. I suddenly looked over at my computer and it had STARTED UP NORMALLY. As if nothing had ever happened. I don't know if some of the fiddling I did last night fixed it, or if it's just a miracle. Either way, I was THRILLED!

So moving on to lighter (more interesting) things . . .

I don't really like ribs, mainly because they're so messy to eat. But boneless ribs are a different story. This is one of our favorite recipes and it's really quick and easy. The meat can be on the pricey side, but we often find it on sale.

SLOW COOKER BONELESS RIBS

• 1 large onion, sliced into rings
  
• 2 1/2 pounds boneless country-style pork ribs (for the three of us, we make one pound and cut the recipe in half)
  
• 1 bottle barbecue sauce . . . Sweet Baby Ray's is our favorite (I think it's usually 16 oz - we use a little over half when we're just making a pound.)
  
• 1/3 cup maple syrup
• 1/4 cup spicy brown mustard
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp pepper

1. Put onion in a layer on the bottom of the slow cooker. Top the onion with the ribs.
2. Mix the barbecue sauce, syrup, mustard, salt and pepper in a bowl and pour over the ribs.
3. Cover and cook on low for 7 - 8 hours. We turn the meat once during the day and will uncover it for the last 30 minutes or so to let the sauce thicken up a little.

The meat is so tender and delicious! I sometimes do one of the steam-in-the-bag veggie and rice sides and rolls or baked potatoes and a salad. I'm getting hungry just writing about this!