If you're new to central Texas BBQ, seek it out at this spot in the Upper Beaches and Bloor West Village. Here, pork ribs are rubbed with spices then cooked over indirect heat from pecan or oak wood until they're succulent and smoky with just the right amount of chew. Visit when beef ribs are available for the full experience.

It's worth dropping in for a meal of St. Louis-style spare ribs made at this casual barbecue house in the Port Lands. Smoked over white oak and aggressively seasoned, every morsel is crisp and tender, the fatty meat rendered rich and seductive and entirely impossible to ignore.

Dishes draw on a number of Southern influences, techniques and flavours at this restaurant in West Queen West and Baldwin Village. Ribs — side, baby back, beef chuck or beef back — are seasoned with signature spice rub and glazed in spicy, sweet sauce with extra served alongside for those who like things messy.

Halal meats are transformed by fire, smoke, spice and love at this unassuming Scarborough spot. Anointed with tangy, thick house barbecue sauce, meat falls off beef back ribs into tempting morsels. Feeling ravenous? Order the dino short ribs for more meat per inch.

From Wednesday to Saturday, barbecue fiends pile into this simple spot at Yonge & Eglinton for the type of meat dreams are made of. Choose between St Louis-style side ribs and baby back ribs, knowing that whichever you choose will deliver sticky, sweet, finger-licking satisfaction.

Follow the scent of slow-smoked meat to this takeout shop in Leslieville, where a passion for barbecue translates to seriously delicious food. Using a signature Memphis dry rub and judicious smoking, owner Dang Quach creates enviable bark on each and every pork back rib he touches.

Whether it's the relaxed hospitality, the fastidious attention to quality or the smoked ribs, this Roncesvalles Village barbecue restaurant has been a go-to since it opened in 2011. Whichever way you like them — basted with classic barbecue sauce or thoroughly rubbed with lemon pepper or 5-spice honey garlic seasoning, the team's baby back ribs are a must-have on every table.

Using a smoker built in Mesquite, Texas, the team at this buzzing spot at Yonge & Lawrence cranks out plate after plate of quality barbecue. Zingy Jack Daniels sauce and eons in the smoker yield burnished baby backs that are sticky, sweet, and best sided with beer and a towering stack of wet wipes.

It's easy to get lost in the bloated menu at this Corso Italia spot. Instead, hone in on slow-cooked baby back ribs slathered in kicky house barbecue sauce. Pub grub is easy to come by but fall-off-the-bone barbecue greatness is a much rarer commodity.