Name: Boston Baked Beans
Ingredients: 1 quart pea beans; ½ pound fat salt pork; 1 tablespoon coarse sea salt; 1 tablespoon molasses; 3 tablespoons sugar; 1 cup boiling water

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 ↓

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

Pick over the beans and soak them in cold water overnight.
Drain the beans.
Cover the beans with fresh water.
Heat the beans slowly until the skins burst.
Drain the beans again.
Discard the water outside.

Prepare the pork

Scald the pork rind.
Scrape the pork rind.
Slice off a ¼ inch piece of pork rind to place in the bottom of a bean pot.
Cut the remaining pork rind every ½ inch deep.

Assemble and bake

Place the beans in the pot.
Bury the pork in the beans.
Leave the rind exposed.
Mix the salt, molasses, and sugar with 1 cup of boiling water.
Pour the mixture over the beans.
Add enough boiling water to cover the beans.
Cover the pot.
Bake at 300°F (150°C) for 6 to 8 hours.
Uncover the pot for the last hour to brown the rind.
Add water as needed during baking.

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.

Beans + porktop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,000 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Molasses + sugartop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together9,225 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Beans + molassestop 26% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together491 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Beans + sugartop 26% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,587 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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

Pea beans: Provide the main body and starch that become tender during long slow baking.
Fat salt pork: Adds fat and savory flavor to the beans, and the scored rind crisps and browns on top.
Molasses: Adds dark color, moisture, and a deep sweet flavor to the bean sauce.
Sugar: Adds sweetness and helps the sauce darken and thicken during baking.

The step that matters

Heat the beans slowly until the skins burst. Gentle heat lets the bean skins soften and split without the beans breaking apart. Boiling hard can break the beans and leave the skins tough.

Swap the beans

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

Beansthe original
Chestnutfits about as well
Peanutfits about as well
Sesamefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against 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.

Pork Cake107 recipes

Roast Pork82 recipes

Molasses Sauce32 recipes

German Style String Beans7 recipes

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Boston Baked Beans