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Pork and Beans

A slow-baked dish of beans and salt pork, seasoned with sea salt and optionally molasses.

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

Pork and Beans

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the beans

  1. Pick over the beans and soak them overnight.

  2. Wash and drain the beans.

  3. Boil the beans in cold water for 30 minutes.

  4. Drain the beans and pour them into an earthen pot.

Assemble and bake

  1. Place the salt pork in the center, scored in slices or squares, and season with coarse sea salt.

  2. Cover the beans with hot water.

  3. Bake in a moderate oven (350°F / 175°C) for 12 hours or longer.

  4. Add hot water as needed.

  5. Keep the dish covered to prevent burning.

  6. Remove the cover 1-2 hours before serving to brown the top and crisp the pork.

  7. Optionally, add 1 tablespoon of molasses for color.

Serve

  1. Serve the dish.

  2. Enjoy leftovers as cold beans or warmed baked beans.

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

Beans
Provide the main body and starch that make up the dish.
Salt pork
Adds fat and savory flavor as it renders into the beans during slow baking.
Molasses
Adds sweetness and darker color to the beans.

The step that matters

Keep the dish covered while baking. A covered pot traps moisture so the beans cook gently without drying out or scorching on the bottom. Adding hot water as needed keeps the beans submerged over the long bake.

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.

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