Baked Beans

My sister and brother-in-law called me earlier today to invite themselves over for a couple hours this evening. They said they'll bring the steaks to grill, so... there's no turning them down. They live a couple of hours away and were going to be almost in the area anyway, so we take them as visitors whenever they happen to be around!

I decided I'm going to make a few dishes to go along with the meal. Baked beans. They just sounded good to me. I don't know if it's because it was lunch time, because I'm pregnant, or if that's just what I have on hand and it goes well with meat, but they sure sounded appetizing. The problem was I didn't feel like a had a ton of time to prepare them so I decided to skip a step and not use a recipe. It's too much work finding one I think I might like! Besides that, a quick trip to Pinterest told me that most people's bean recipes call for canned pork and beans. Can somebody tell me why? I thought pork+beans was basically pre made baked beans? I guess it doesn't make sense to me. I generally only have raw simple ingredients on hand, so my only option was to start from dry beans. 

I didn't measure the beans. I said I was just going to throw something together, so I poured in what I thought might be enough, added water, and started cooking. Meanwhile I mixed a few random ingredients that I thought might be good in baked beans. Homemade ketchup, molasses, maple syrup, dry mustard, and salt. When the beans had finished cooking I reserved the bean liquid, salted the beans, mixed in my concoction, added some chopped onion, and poured enough bean juice back in to reach the desired consistency. Of course I taste tested them to make sure I was satisfied. A couple spoonfuls later I decided it not only was good enough, but I didn't make as much as I should've. I'm sure I consumed my portion already. I had to stick them in the oven to bake pretty quick just to keep my spoon from dipping back in. I have the oven set somewhere between 325-350* and plan to bake them for 3 hours. It really helps the flavors blend when you bake them over a longer amount of time. You just need to make sure they don't dry out in the process.

Now to torture myself with the aromas floating from the kitchen for the next hour or two. 

I think the no recipe was a success, but we'll have to wait for the final taste post-baking to double check. ;) This is how I cook. It's no wonder after being married over a year my husband still told people I hardly made the same dish twice!