Why it works: Beans and onion match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,242 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓
Boston Baked Beans
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare the beans
Wash and pick over the beans, then soak them in fresh cold water overnight.
Drain the beans, cover with fresh water, and bring to a boil. Simmer until the skins crack.
Discard the tested beans and drain again.
Prepare the pot
Scald the pork rind, scrape it, and cut two ¼-inch slices to place in the bottom of a bean pot.
Peel and slice the onion over the pork in the pot.
Score the remaining pork rind every ½ inch, making 1-inch deep incisions.
Add the beans to the pot, bury the pork in them, leaving only the rind exposed.
In a bowl, mix the salt, molasses, sugar, and boiling water, then pour over the beans.
Fill the pot with boiling water until it bubbles up among the beans.
Bake
Cover the pot and bake at 300°F (150°C) for 6 to 8 hours, removing the cover for the last 30 minutes to brown the beans and crisp the pork rind.
Add more water as necessary during baking.
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.
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Beans + oniontop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together5,242 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Pork + oniontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together18,214 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Beans + porktop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,000 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
-
Molasses + sugartop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together9,225 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Beans + molassestop 26% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together491 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
- Pea beans
- Provide the bulk of the dish, becoming tender and creamy during the long slow bake.
- Salt pork
- Adds fat and savory flavor that seeps into the beans, and its rind crisps on top.
- Molasses
- Adds dark color and a rich, slightly bitter sweetness to the sauce.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness that balances the salt and molasses in the sauce.
- Onion
- Adds aromatic savory flavor as it cooks slowly with the pork and beans.
The step that matters
Removing the cover for the last 30 minutes. Uncovering the pot lets surface liquid evaporate and the sugars and molasses caramelize, browning the beans and crisping the pork rind. Covering the whole time would leave the top pale and soft.
Swap the onion
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beans, pork, molasses, sugar):
- Sweet potatofits better
- Mustardfits better
- Capsicumfits better
- Onionthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against beans, pork, molasses, sugar. 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.
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