Boston Baked Beans
- Total Time
- 3 to 4 hours, plus overnight soaking of beans
- Rating
- Comments
- Read comments
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Ingredients
- 1pound dried navy or Great Northern beans
- ½pound salt pork or bacon, rind removed, cut into ¼-inch dice
- 1onion, chopped
- 4garlic cloves, peeled
- ½cup dark molasses or maple syrup, preferably Grade B
- ¼cup ketchup
- 3tablespoons mustard powder
- 1tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
- 1teaspoon pepper, plus more to taste
- 1thyme branch (optional)
- 1bay leaf (optional)
- 1teaspoon salt, plus more to taste
- 1tablespoon cider vinegar, plus more to taste
Nutritional analysis per serving (10 servings)
288 calories; 19 grams fat; 7 grams saturated fat; 0 grams trans fat; 9 grams monounsaturated fat; 2 grams polyunsaturated fat; 24 grams carbohydrates; 3 grams dietary fiber; 12 grams sugars; 5 grams protein; 855 milligrams sodium
Note: The information shown is Edamam’s estimate based on available ingredients and preparation. It should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice.
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Preparation
- Step 1
Pick through the beans for stones, rinse them thoroughly and soak in water overnight. (Leave soaking until ready to cook; you'll need the water.)
- Step 2
Heat oven to 300 degrees. Place a Dutch oven, 5-quart size or larger, over low heat. Add the salt pork or bacon and fry until crisp, 12 to 15 minutes. Raise heat to medium and stir in the onion. Cook until onion is translucent, stirring occasionally, 5 to 8 minutes.
- Step 3
Add the beans to the pan along with enough of the soaking liquid to cover them by ½ inch, adding fresh water if needed. Add the garlic cloves, molasses or maple syrup, ketchup, mustard powder, Worcestershire sauce, 1 teaspoon pepper and the thyme branch and bay leaf, if using. Stir well and bring to a boil. Cover the pot and put in oven.
- Step 4
Check the liquid level in the pot every hour or so, and add hot water as needed to barely cover the beans. Cook until beans are very soft but not falling apart, 2 to 3 hours. Remove from oven. Stir in 1 teaspoon salt and 1 tablespoon vinegar; let sit at room temperature for 30 minutes, then taste a bean and some liquid, adding more salt, pepper or vinegar, if you like. Serve, or cool completely and reheat.
Private Notes
Comments
Is it possible the 3 tablespoons of mustard powder is a typo? Should it be 3 teaspoons (1 tablespoon)?
There is no tomato (ketchup or paste) in real New England/Boston Baked Beans. Same with Worcestershire, thyme and bay leaf.
This is supposed to be a very simple, slow cooked dish. Crock pot/slow cooker will work fine. See Sam Sifton's recipe, also here in NYTimes Cooking, for a more authentic version.
Diced ham, if you have it, is a fine alternative to other pork ingredients.
I prefer tomato paste to ketchup, which has too many, perhaps unwanted, ingredients in it.
If you're concerned about how much dried mustard to use, reconstitute it first, with hot water, then add it, a small spoonat a time, till you get the bite you want.
Molasses is traditional, but maple syrup is so much richer.
A dash of soy sauce Can be the secret ingredient here.
I grew up on Van de Camps and have a nostalgia for them, but like so many things my memory of them is better than my current experience (true also of pop tarts). These taste like the Platonic ideal of Van De Camps! One thing I loved about the canned beans was heating the open can in a campfire. It just might be worth it to bring some empty soup cans to heat these beans in on camping trips!
Rancho Gordo (best dried beans ever and a fave of many home cooks and chefs) recently advised me (as per customer feedback) to not soak dried beans more than 8 hours. Toughens them. That has been my experience, too.
We add ground clove
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