Skip to main content
Main

Baked Beans

A hearty bean dish cooked with salt pork, butter, molasses, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Beans and pork are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,000 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Baked Beans

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beans

  1. Soak the beans overnight.

  2. Place the beans in a pot with 1 gallon of soft water and ½ teaspoon of baking soda. Simmer slowly until the beans are swollen but not burst.

  3. Remove the beans with a skimmer and keep them hot in a pan of clear hot water.

Bake and serve

  1. Pour boiling water over the salt pork, scrape the rind, and score it.

  2. Place the pork in a flat stone crock and surround it with the beans.

  3. Add 1 tablespoon of butter and 2 tablespoons of molasses.

  4. Fill the crock with boiling water and bake for 4 to 5 hours.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Beans + porktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,000 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Pork + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,933 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  3. Beans + buttertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,799 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Beans + molassestop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together491 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Butter + molassestop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,123 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Beans
Form the bulk of the dish, becoming tender and creamy as they cook slowly.
Salt pork
Adds fat and savory flavor that seasons the beans during the long bake.
Baking soda
Raises the cooking water's alkalinity, helping the beans soften.
Molasses
Adds sweetness and a deep color as it caramelizes in the oven.
Butter
Adds richness and fat for a smoother, more rounded flavor.

The step that matters

Simmer slowly until the beans are swollen but not burst. High heat or boiling hard makes the bean skins split and the beans fall apart. Gentle simmering keeps them intact while the starches soften, so they stay whole through the long bake.

Swap the beans

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, butter, molasses):

  1. Beansthe original
  2. Peanutfits about as well
  3. Almondfits about as well
  4. Lima beansfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, butter, molasses. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

More baked beans recipes

Boston 154with Pork 8Canadian 8in Earthen Pots 3Chicago 3New England 3 See all 214 →

You might also like

Pork CakePork Cake107 recipesRoast PorkRoast Pork82 recipesMolasses SauceMolasses Sauce32 recipesGerman Style String BeansGerman Style String Beans7 recipes