Skip to main content
Main

Beans, Baked, Canned

Canned baked beans made with dried beans, pork, salt, bicarbonate of soda, and molasses, cooked and sealed in cans.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 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 ↓

Beans, Baked, Canned

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beans

  1. Wash the dried beans and discard the water.

  2. Soak the beans overnight and discard the water again.

  3. Parboil the beans until soft and discard the water.

Fill the cans

  1. Weigh out pork according to can size: 1½ ounces for 1‑pound cans, 2½ ounces for 2‑pound cans, 4 ounces for 3‑pound cans.

  2. Place the pork in the bottom of the cans and add the beans.

  3. Prepare a cooked solution of salt, bicarbonate of soda, and molasses, and pour it into the cans.

Seal and cook

  1. Seal the cans and boil them in an open bath for 30 minutes.

  2. Puncture the cans to release steam and air, then seal them again.

  3. Cook the sealed cans in a retort at 246°F (119°C) for about 1 hour.

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Pork + molassestop 34% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together825 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

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

What each ingredient does

Dried beans
Form the bulk of the dish and provide starch and body once softened by soaking and parboiling.
Pork
Adds fat and savory meaty flavor that carries into the beans during cooking.
Molasses
Provides sweetness, dark color and the characteristic baked-bean flavor.
Bicarbonate of soda
Raises the pH of the beans, helping them soften and brown during cooking.

The step that matters

Puncture the cans to release steam and air, then seal them again. Trapped steam and air can build pressure and spoil the contents or deform the can. Venting removes them before the final heat treatment, and resealing restores a airtight pack for safe storage.

Swap the beans

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

  1. Beansthe original
  2. Peanutfits about as well
  3. Sesamefits less well
  4. Nutsfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, 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.

You might also like

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