This recipe comes
from Brad’s mother (Ruth Wallace), and I’m leaving it in her own words.
Somewhere along the way, we got in the habit of having beans on either
Christmas Eve or New Year’s Eve. Makes everyone gassy and not fit for company,
of course, but they taste so good that who cares? (As an ironic side note...after I went through the process of making these one year, I found out that Ruth actually doesn't use this recipe anymore. Instead, she cheats and uses canned baked beans and adds a little mustard and spices. Still, the "from scratch" version is quite good.)
1 lb. Navy Pea Beans
4 cups cold tap water
½ cup Vermont Maple Syrup
½ cup packed dark brown sugar
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. dry mustard
2 cups chopped onion (1 large)
8 slices thick cut Vermont corn cob smoked bacon, or your
favorite bacon (1/2 lb)
Carefully sort
through and thoroughly wash beans. Soak
beans 4 hours or overnight in water to cover 2 inches above beans. Drain beans and place them in a large pot
with the 4 cups of fresh cold water.
Cover and bring to a boil. Reduce
heat to medium low and cook for 20 minutes.
Stir beans once midway through cooking.
While beans are
cooking, prepare the following:
- In a large mixing bowl, stir together the maple syrup, brown sugar and seasoning
- Add the chopped onion to the maple syrup mixture
- Fry the eight strips of bacon until crisp. Drain on paper towels
Remove cooked beans
from heat. Pour the beans (liquid
included) into the maple syrup mixture and gently but thoroughly stir to
blend. Place ½ of the bean mixture in
bean pot or a 2 ½ to 3 quart casserole dish.
Lay four pieces of cooked bacon on beans, then add the remaining bean
mixture. Top with remaining four bacon
slices. Cover and bake at 300 degrees
for five hours. Check every 2 hours to
add water if necessary.
Ruth says: I soak my beans
overnight and use a bean pot to cook them in.
I like them a little less sweet so you can reduce the brown sugar or
even eliminate it if you want and I would do 2 tsp. of dry mustard.
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