I see what you did there, Steve, and I see why it works and why what I did doesn’t.

I have never used a sweet sauce with back ribs; I use a dry rub and vinegar mop sauce, Low Country style. (I learned about ribs from a nice lady at church. She was from Raleigh, North Carolina.) An important part of the technique is smoke, which I can’t do in the oven without bringing the fire brigade down on us. So I had that batch of ribs in the oven at 275 degrees Fahrenheit until they were fully cooked, and then put them in the barbecue to smoke.

We ate some cold for supper tonight, and they were actually great — texture good, flavour just right. So not the failure I had convinced myself I had committed.