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Superior Pork and Beans

A stew of pork and beans simmered until tender, then browned with the pork.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 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 ↓

Superior Pork and Beans

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beans

  1. Sort the beans.

  2. Soak the beans in soft water overnight.

  3. Parboil the beans.

  4. Drain the beans twice.

Cook the pork and beans

  1. Add the pork to the beans with fresh water.

  2. Bring the mixture to a boil.

  3. Skim the surface.

  4. Boil for 5 minutes.

  5. Drain the pork and beans thoroughly.

  6. In a pot, add the beans and pork with just enough water to cover them.

  7. Simmer gently until tender, ensuring the water evaporates and the beans are nearly dry.

  8. Taste the dish.

  9. Add more salt if needed, but be careful not to over-salt.

Bake and brown

  1. Spread the beans evenly in a baking dish.

  2. Slash the pork.

  3. Place the sliced pork on a separate pan to bake until browned.

  4. Stir the beans often until 20 minutes before serving.

  5. Spread the beans evenly and let them brown.

  6. If the beans are not browning enough, brush them with egg.

  7. Brown the beans with a hot iron or other method.

  8. Place the pork in the center of the beans.

  9. Discard excess fat.

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).

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, becoming tender and absorbing flavour as they simmer.
Pork
Adds fat and savoury flavour that enriches the beans as they cook together.
Egg (in the method)
Brushed on the beans to help the surface brown more evenly.

The step that matters

Simmer gently until tender. Gentle heat softens the beans evenly without bursting their skins. Letting the water evaporate concentrates flavour, but the beans must stay moist enough to cook through before they dry out.

“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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