Cuts · US butchery
St Louis-style ribs
Spareribs trimmed to a rectangle. Worth recording separately because it is a TRIM, not an anatomy — the model has to be able to say that two products from the same bones are different things to cook.
Known as
The same muscle carries different names in different butchery systems, and some of those names mean different cuts elsewhere. Where a name is ambiguous, BBQHQ says so rather than picking one.
- United States
- St Louis-style ribs
- St. Louis cut
- st louis cut — barbecue
- st louis ribs — barbecue
What to ask a butcher for
- United States: A spare rack squared off — sternum, cartilage and rib tips removed. It is a trim, not a cut, so a butcher can do it to order.
Where it comes from on the animal
Pork belly and rib cage
Belly · moderate use · connective tissue: moderate
Layered fat and muscle over the lower rib cage. Both spareribs and pork belly come from here, which is why 'ribs' means one thing to somebody who bought spareribs and another to somebody who bought back ribs off the loin.
Muscles: Rectus abdominis, Obliquus, Intercostales
Asking a butcher for it
Named the way us butchery names it. If the counter does not recognise the name, the anatomy is the fallback: ask for the cut by where it comes from.
- What to say
- St Louis-style ribs, or St. Louis cut (US) depending where you are.
- If that draws a blank
- Ask for belly — the muscle is Rectus abdominis, Obliquus, Intercostales.
- What to specify
- Typical weight is 0.9–1.4 kg.
What it is suited to
Derived from how hard the muscle works and how much connective tissue it carries, which is the pairing that decides whether a cut wants a fire under it or beside it. BBQHQ does not rank cuts and does not name a best one.
- Moderate connective tissue: it will take either approach, and the two give genuinely different results rather than one being a compromise.
What to use instead
A substitute is not the same as an equivalent. These are graded, because “yes, use that instead” is the answer that ruins dinners: most real substitutions work only once something about the cook changes.
No cut in UK butchery corresponds
Not a substitute for this
A trim style rather than a distinct cut, and not one British retail performs. A butcher can square a spare rack to order if you describe it: sternum, cartilage and rib tips off.
Asking for it in another country
UK butchery: No direct equivalent
A trim style rather than a distinct cut, and not one British retail performs. A butcher can square a spare rack to order if you describe it: sternum, cartilage and rib tips off.
The UK side of these mappings rests on AHDB’s published cutting specifications, which BBQHQ has read. The US side does not: USDA’s Institutional Meat Purchase Specifications and the Beef Checkoff cut pages both refuse automated access, so no mapping here reaches “same cut” across two butchery systems. See the open question.
Typical size
0.9–1.4 kg