Recipe: Homemade Baked Beans
Posted on | January 19, 2010 | 14 Comments
It’s been snowing here off and on for two days. Monday afternoon I made up a big pot of homemade Vermont Baked Beans from my new book, The New England Yankee Cookbook. At first the whole idea of making beans on a snowy winter day seemed quite idealitic.
The process to make homemade beans is a long one. You have to soak the beans overnight and then bake them in the oven for 3-4 hours. Traditionally, you bake your beans in a ceramic bean pot. I got my bean pot from my mom. Newer versions can be found online. Scour antique shops in New England for the real thing. After an afternoon of tending to my beans I was anticipating the most glorious bean flavor ever. I served them in bowls over warmed brown bread. Greg wasn’t nearly excited about my bean feast. He thought it was bit strange that we would be eating just beans and bread for dinner. I consoled him, “If they are bad we can get takeout.”
My first reaction, “Wow they taste just like B&M canned beans.” Smoky, maple syrupy, and tangy. B&M based in Portland, Maine prides themselves on cooking their beans the New England way—using bean pots, salt pork and baked them in brick ovens. I’m not one to recommend canned products but in this scenario canned baked beans are just as good and a lot less work. B&M has really mastered the art of making homemade beans in a can. Next time, I probably just buy a can and focus my time on making a more substantial dinner like ribs rather then tending beans. Below the recipe adapted from The New England Yankee Cookbook.
Baked Beans With Vermont Maple Syrup
1 quart pea beans
1/2 pound fat salt pork
1 onion
1/2 cup maple syrup
1/2 teaspoon dry mustard
2 teaspoons salt
boiling water
Soak beans overnight. In the morning drain and rinse beans. Put a chopped onion in the bottom of bean pot; add beans. Mix syrup, mustard and salt and sprinkle over beans. Put pork down into beans so only the rind shows. I used diced canadian bacon in place of fat salt pork. Pour boiling water to cover.
Bake in 350 degree oven for 3-4 hours, adding water to cover. Beans will cook down to a thick sauce.
Related Posts:
Recipe: Real Maine Whoopie Pies
Recipe: Fennel-Steamed Mussels Provencal
The New England Yankee Cookbook
Posted on | January 14, 2010 | 5 Comments
A foodie friend sent me a link to The New England Yankee Cookbook and The Salt Book: Lobstering, Sea Moss Pudding, Stone Walls, Rum Running, Maple Syrup, Snowshoes, and Other Yankee Doings last week. He figured they would be up right up my alley. The New England Yankee came yesterday in the mail. Originally printed in 1939 the cookbook is a collection of recipes and stories from New England. The recipes were compiled from the files of Yankee magazine and “time-worn recipe books”. Notes below many of recipes include names, addresses, and origins of the recipe recalling a time when we didn’t associate each other by our blog or twitter names. Desire’s Baked Plum Pudding ["My great grandmother's Thanksgiving pudding"—Edith W. Webber, 16 Thorndyke St., Beverly, Mass.]
Many variations on a single recipe appear in the cookbook giving the reader the option to dispute who’s baked beans really are the best? Boston Baked Beans, Vermont Baked Beans with Maple Syrup, New Hampshire Baked Yellow Eye Pork and Maine Baked Beans Lumberjack Style. Explanations to why New Englanders eat Baked Beans (Puritan influence) on Saturday nights and how that tradition still continues in thousand of homes to this day. I understand this book was written in 1939 but I can tell you for a fact, New Englanders still enjoy a good Bean Supper on a Saturday night.
Flipping through the pages I recall recipes from my own childhood like New England Pot Roast, Brown Bread, Parker House Rolls, Maine Molasses doughnuts, and Fish Chowder. Every Sunday for pretty much my entire childhood my father made Pot Roast. I have memories of loving it when I was kid, hating it when I was teenager and now today wanting to make it again to remind me of those Sundays with my dad. Recipes tell the stories of our pasts and our families. Buy now through amazon.com
Related Posts:
Real Maine Whoopie Pies
Lost Crafts: Rediscovering Traditional Skills
Follow Me
-
House Renovation Posts
Provencal Kitchen
Olive Gray
Baby Bump in Paris!
Mint In A Pot
We Eloped!
Green Inspiration
Country Laundry Room
Fiddleheads With Linguine
Small Scale Sofas
Site Feed
About Blog
A journal about new england life, decorating inspiration, and renovating a 262-year-old house in Marblehead, Massachusetts. read more...
Press & Mentions
