Name: Boston Baked Beans
Ingredients: 1 pint navy beans; 1 heaping teaspoon coarse sea salt; 1 teaspoon black pepper; 1 tablespoon molasses; 1 teaspoon dry mustard; ½ pound salt pork; water to cover beans

Why it works: Beans and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 852 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

Soak the navy beans overnight.
The next morning, cook the beans until the skin breaks.

Bake

Transfer the beans to a bean pot.
Add salt, black pepper, molasses, and dry mustard.
Cut the salt pork into pieces and lay it over the beans.
Pour in enough water to cover the beans.
Bake slowly at 300°F (150°C) for the rest of the day.

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 + mustardtop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together852 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together15,430 recipes

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

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,733 recipes

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

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,000 recipes

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

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,445 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

Navy beans: Form the main body of the dish and set its texture as they soften during cooking.
Salt pork: Renders fat into the beans, adding richness and savory flavor as it bakes.
Molasses: Adds sweetness and deep color through caramelization during slow baking.
Dry mustard: Contributes a sharp, pungent note that balances the sweetness of the molasses.

The step that matters

Bake slowly at 300°F (150°C) for the rest of the day. Long, low heat lets the beans become tender and creamy without bursting, while collagen in the pork softens and the sugars darken gradually. Baking too hot can split the skins and dry the beans 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.