New England: a BBQ Wasteland

It's no secret that New England really doesn't have many if any good options for BBQ. You get lucky every so often, but it's mostly miss and few hits. And having experienced "aha" moments when eating BBQ in Texas and Kansas City, our pursuit has begun as an at home effort.
So today we took a little chance and tried our hand at smoking something without having say an actual smoker or optimal apple or oak chips. What we did have was a beautiful rack of baby back pork ribs, purchased at the Dewey Square Farmers Market in Boston from the River View farm stand. This little stand has various cuts of meat from the farm, and so far I've enjoyed beef and the most incredible thick cut pork chops that I've ever had. But this time, I opted for the ribs, and thought we'd look failure straight in the face and give it our best shot.
So first, we put together an interesting rub. About a cup of light brown sugar, and a tablespoon each of five spice powder, smoked paprika, chili powder, garlic powder, salt, pepper, and all spice. We mixed the rub together, and gave the ribs the swedish massage treatment. A half hour later, after adding mesquite chips to a gas grill, (apologies, it's all we had on hand), we set the ribs to smoking for about three and a half hours.

Now, for a first try, they definitely were pretty solid. The sweet, tangy, and salty rub did some serious justice to the ribs. I think that we probably could have let them go for an extra hour, but other than that, I'm going to stand by that rub, and thought that the five spice powder was a nice and different addition when compared to other rubs that we've enjoyed. 
So if you too feel that you need to take BBQ matters into your own hands, you may want to give this rub a try, maybe use oak or apple chips instead of the mesquite, and see how they turn out. Happy outdoor low and slow cooking.