Old Fashioned Baked Beans with Bacon
Both, my mother and father, liked to cook. It wasn’t a rigid schedule but most of the time during the week, my mother did the cooking and on the weekends, it was my father although many times, dad didn’t cook for weeks. Between the two of them, they made many great recipes! From simple comfort foods to traditional and elegant dishes, it was a rotation of yumminess 🥰 in our family kitchen! One that we all really liked was Old Fashioned Baked Beans!
My father was the one who often made them. When he started soaking the beans in water on Friday after work, we knew we would be having them for dinner over the weekend and if there were any leftovers, we’d have them for breakfast on Sunday along with eggs 🥚 and toast. After soaking the beans, he rinsed them the following morning and slowly cooked them for hours. There was a lovely aroma floating through the air the entire day perfect on cold Canadian 🍁 days!
When I moved out on my own, either I was too lazy to make them or not ready to eat beans the whole week (it’s a big batch) therefore buying 🛒 them at the store was more convenient. Recently, I was asking my mother if those baked beans in the brown glass jar were still available at the supermarket. Apparently not although it was a cool concept! The shape was a miniature duplicate of a traditional Bean Pot just like the one I’m using in the video and the container was made of dark glass; dark amber in color. The only thing we had to do was to remove the lid, follow the baking instructions and pop them in the oven.
I have to admit, they were quite good. The only place I could find them was in Québec’s supermarkets so when I moved to Ontario, I had to start making my own beans from scratch. After years of practice 👩🍳, I tweaked the recipe quite a lot from my parents’ traditional one. Now, they make mine…
This Old Fashioned Baked Beans with Bacon 🥓 is a dish that can be served as a side with Chicken Breasts, Brown Sugar Mustard Glazed Ham, Texas BBQ Slow Cooker Pulled Pork, and so on. It’s also very delicious to enjoy in the morning with your eggs, pancakes 🥞, waffles or French toast.
For dinner, the way I like to eat them is with a fried egg and toast for dipping, topped with Québec maple syrup. I introduced this to David and now, he likes eating my Old Fashioned Baked Beans with Bacon my way too – copycat! Here’s a great kitchen trick for you to use when dealing with sticky ingredients 🍯… Measuring Honey, Syrup or Molasses without Sticking.
This dish freezes well so you can have it later for lunch or a picnic. As warmer weather 🌼 is approaching, this is an awesome recipe you can also serve at your backyard BBQ party…
Bon Appétit!🍽
Check out these other great legume recipes…😀
– Bunny Chow
– Red Beans and Rice – Slow Cooker
– Moroccan Couscous Salad
– Roasted Red Pepper Hummus
– Chickpea Corn Salad
– Texas Caviar
– Beluga Black Lentil Salad
and for even more Québec recipes, click on this link… Recipe Category • International Cuisine
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Old Fashioned Baked Beans with Bacon
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Ingredients
- 3 cups navy beans
- 1 tsp. ground Himalayan pink salt
- 3/4 cup molasses, preferably blackstrap, divided tips & tricks
- 3 tbsp. brown sugar, such as demerara
- 1 tbsp. prepared yellow mustard
- 1/4 tsp. dry mustard
- 1/8 tsp. baking soda
- freshly ground black pepper, to taste (I always use mixed peppercorns)
- 6 slices bacon
- 1 large red onion, halved and cut into 8 pieces
Directions
- Place the beans in a large bowl and cover with cold water, 2 inches above. Leave it out on the counter overnight.
- Twelve hours later, drain the beans and transfer them to a large pot. Cover with cold water, add sea salt and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to medium and simmer for 40 minutes or until tender.
- Drain the beans and reserve the cooking liquid.
- Transfer the drained beans back to the large pot and set aside.
- Meanwhile when the beans are simmering, in a mixing bowl combine 1/2 cup molasses, brown sugar, prepared mustard, dry mustard, baking soda and black pepper; stir and set aside.
- Take 1 slice of bacon and rub the sides of the inside of the bean pot. Cut bacon slices into pieces; set aside.
- Place 4 onion pieces at the bottom of the pot and set aside.
- Preheat oven to 325ºF
- Pour the sauce over the beans and mix to coat. Add bacon pieces, stir and pour half of the bean mixture into the bean pot over the 4 onion pieces. Add the remaining onion pieces and pour in the remaining sauce. Season with more black pepper and add the remaining ¼ cup of molasses; stir just the top to spread the molasses evenly.
- Pour in enough of the reserved liquid to cover the bean mixture.
- Cover with the lid and transfer to the preheated oven; cook for 6 hours.
- Every hour, check to see if it needs more liquid. If so, add more of the reserved liquid.
- The last hour, pour in enough liquid to cover and continue cooking without the lid to darken the beans.
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