Homemade Baked Beans

Baked beans are popular menu for breakfast and meals. Many of us rely on ready-made canned baked beans since they are easy to store and use. You just need to heat the canned baked beans before serving. These canned baked beans contain preservatives and salt in large quantity and make the recipe less nutritious. Though homemade baked beans require too much of time for preparation and cooking, they are healthy and nutritious. Moreover, they are also tastier than those canned baked beans. If you use dried beans in your homemade recipe, you need to soak the beans overnight, while canned beans can be directly used while cooking. Try to use variety of beans in your recipe and you can serve baked beans with any meal like hamburgers, hotdogs, tortillas, etc. Here are two easy recipes for baked beans.

Recipe #1

Ingredients

• Water - 4 cups
• Ketchup - ¼ cup
• Brown sugar - 2 tablespoons
• Maple syrup - ¼ cup
• Molasses - 2 tablespoons
• Worcestershire sauce - 1 teaspoon
• Dried navy beans - 1 cup
• Salt - ½ teaspoon
• Chili powder - 1 pinch
• Small onion (chopped) - 1
• Ground black pepper - 1 pinch

Procedure

Take a large vessel and put the navy beans into it. Pour cool water in the vessel to cover the navy beans 4 inches above. Let the beans soak for at least 8 hours or overnight. Then, drain and rinse the beans and preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit. Take a large saucepan and place the soaked beans in it. Pour 4 cups of water to it and bring the mixture to boil over high heat. After that, reduce the heat to medium-low and cover the saucepan. Let the mixture simmer for at least an hour. Take a small bowl and combine maple syrup, ketchup, brown sugar, Worcestershire sauce, salt, pepper, molasses and chili powder in it.

Stir the mixture properly and keep it aside. After simmering the beans for one hour, drain the beans and collect the liquid in a small bowl. Place the beans in a casserole dish and add chopped onion and molasses sauce to it. Then pour the reserved liquid over the beans to cover the beans by ¼ inch. Cover the casserole dish and bake the mixture in the preheated oven for 10 minutes. After 10 minutes reduce the temperature of the oven to 200 degrees Fahrenheit. Bake the beans for 6 more hours, stir the mixture in between, after 3 hours. Once the beans are cooked, let the mixture cool down for 15 minutes and then serve.

Recipe #2

Ingredients

• Garlic (minced) - 1 clove
• Onion (chopped) - 1 cup
• Olive oil - 1 teaspoon
• Bacon - 6 slices
• Pinto beans - 2 cups
• Baked beans - 2 cups
• Red kidney beans - 2 cups
• Great Northern beans - 2 cups
• Garbanzo beans - 1 ½ cups
• Ketchup - ¾ cup
• Pepper - ½ teaspoon
• Worcestershire sauce - 2 tablespoons
• Yellow mustard - 1 tablespoon
• Molasses - ½ cup
• Packed brown sugar - ¼ cup

Procedure

Use canned beans for this recipe. Take a large deep skillet and add olive oil. Cook the bacon slices in the skillet and cook until the slices turn brown. Then, drain out the liquid and reserve 2 tablespoons in the skillet. Crumble the bacon slices and place them in a large bowl. Then, saute chopped onion and garlic in the reserved drippings of bacon in the skillet. Once the onion slices become tender, drain out the excess liquid and add it to bacon in the bowl. Then, add crumbled bacon into the onion and garlic mixture. Combine pinto beans, northern beans, baked beans, kidney beans and garbanzo beans with bacon mixture. Stir to mix the ingredients properly. Then add ketchup, brown sugar, molasses, mustard, Worcestershire sauce and black pepper to the bacon mixture. Mix all the ingredients to combine well and then transfer the mixture to a casserole dish. Cover the dish and bake the mixture in the preheated oven for an hour.

These were some quick recipes for you to prepare baked beans. To make the recipe healthier, try to use dried beans instead of canned beans. To know the difference between dried and canned beans, you can take a look at the article dried beans vs. canned beans. I hope you will try these baked beans recipes at home. Happy Cooking!