Slow Cooker BBQ Ribs

A few months ago, we had a 'home style BBQ' going away party for some friends - Mac and cheese, green bean casserole, and of course, BBQ ribs.  Somehow I volunteered to do ribs (moment of weakness?) which I had never made before.  But every decent wife has to learn to cook ribs sometime, right?  I heard of doing them in the crockpot, but I have to admit I was super nervous.  Generally, while I hope recipes turn out good enough to eat, I'm not that disappointed if they are a flop.  But since everyone was so excited for ribs, I felt a little pressure to make sure they were tasty.  I had NO idea what I was doing.  I scoured the reviews on all recipes.com and asked the guy at the grocery store for help picking out the ribs.  haha

I finally landed on a crockpot recipe and just decided to go for it - worse case scenario, they are ruined and we order pizza.

They turned out awesome!! The meat literally fell off the bone (which apparently is a good thing!?) and people were raving.  Phew.
 
So, here's the recipe.... 

Ingredients: 
4 pounds pork baby back ribs
salt and pepper to taste
2 C. BBQ sauce*
1 C. ketchup*
1/2 C. packed brown sugar
2 TBSP vinegar**
2 tsp dried oregano
2 tsp. Worcestershire sauce
1 dash hot sauce (to taste)
Garlic Powder
Onion Powder

*original recipe called for 2 C. Ketchup and 1 C. Chili sauce but all the reviews said that was too "ketchup-y." 
**original recipe called for 4 TBSP vinegar but all reviews said that was way too much and they cut it back a lot.  I don't remember how much I put in, but I'm just guessing 2 TBSP or less is probably enough.

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees
2. Season ribs with salt and pepper, place in a shallow baking pan.  Brown in the oven for 15 minutes, turn and brown another 15 minutes.  Drain fat
3. In a medium bowl, mix together all other ingredients (sauce).  Place the ribs in the slow cooker (I cut them into mini-slabs of 3 or 4 ribs each).  Pour the sauce over ribs - turning to coat.
4.  Cover and cook on low 6 to 8 hours, until ribs are tender.

I vaguely remember putting them in the oven before the slow cooker, but maybe not for the entire 30 minutes.  Honestly, I don't remember :) Happy experimenting! 


p.s. here's a link to the original recipe on allrecipes.com