One side dish that speaks to my soul is Baked Beans. To me, they are their own food group. They can be a side, the main dish, or even dessert! My favorite way to eat them is using Potato Chips as the vessel to deliver them to your mouth! This works great when you are at a BBQ and don’t want to worry about using silverware or carrying a spoon or fork with you. The Potato chip can be a great scoop for most BBQ sides, especially Baked Beans.

Sure, you can go to the store and buy a can or two of Baked Beans… Yep, even if your fancy and mix two flavors together to create your own flavor profile, they are then just sort of homemade (which counts in my book). BUT true from scratch homemade baked beans are pretty special!

This was the side dish my grandma brought to everything! Always in her crockpot, I remember sticking my hand, holding a precious potato chip, into the crockpot before dinner was ready and ‘sampling’ the beans…

I hope they create as many memories for you as they still do for me!

Baked Beans

Tips

• Can use salt pork or raw bacon
• Keeps well in a crock pot for gatherings
• Potato Chips make a GREAT dipping vessel
• Can add spice with some cayenne pepper for back-end heat

Ingredients

2 pounds Great Northern Beans

1 Large Onion

1 Piece Salt Pork Sliced Thin

1 Cup Molasses

1 ½ Cup Brown Sugar

2 tsp Garlic Powder

2-3 tsp Mustard

1 tsp Vinegar

1 stick butter

1 tsp baking soda

Preparation

1. Clean and soak the beans – use double the amount of water to soak – Soak over night
2. Cook beans in same water you soaked them in with 1 tsp baking soda – cooking time varies, you’ll note doneness by the skin starting to separate from the bean (approx. 1-1.5 hrs)
3. Remove from heat and drain beans
4. Mix beans with all other ingredients, reserving the salt pork (or bacon) until the end
5. Pour mixture in a baking safe container and top with salt pork or bacon.
6. Bake at 350° until beans are tender about 3 hrs.