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Baked Beans

A dish of white beans cooked with salt pork, molasses, and spices, baked until tender.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Beans and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,733 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Baked Beans

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beans

  1. Pick over and wash the beans well; soak overnight.

  2. In the morning, drain the beans and cover with cold water.

  3. Boil for 30 minutes, then drain and cover again with cold water.

  4. Boil until cooked but not broken.

Bake

  1. Place the beans in a baking dish.

  2. In the center, add the parboiled and gashed salt pork.

  3. Add molasses, cayenne pepper, black pepper, and salt if needed.

  4. Cover with some of the liquid from the parboiled pork.

  5. Bake for 3 hours.

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 + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,733 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Beans + porktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,000 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Pork + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,121 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Molasses + peppertop 31% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together897 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

Small white beans
Provide the bulk and starchy body that becomes tender during long cooking.
Salt pork
Adds fat and savory flavor that seasons the beans as it slowly renders.
Molasses
Adds sweetness and deep color to the sauce as it bakes.

The step that matters

Boil until cooked but not broken. Beans must soften fully before baking, but boiling too hard or too long splits their skins and turns them mushy. Stopping when tender keeps them whole through the long bake.

“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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