This recipe came to us, in its original form, from my father-in-law’s sister-in-law’s mother-in-law (no joke!), from a region in the USA famous for its baked beans as a side dish to barbecue. I’ve modified it slightly to reduce the amount of sugar and up the mustard and cider vinegar to give it a little more zing.
For the last two years at a local July 4th party, there have been no left-overs.
Ingredients
3 medium cans (15oz. or 425g each) VanCamps Pork&Beans – excess liquid drained, but not rinsed
1 big handful brown sugar
1/2 cup (120ml) ketchup – or to taste, I usually add more
4 or 5 strips bacon
1 medium onion, diced
1/3 cup (75ml) white corn syrup
2.5 tablespoons cider vinegar
1.5 teaspoon yellow mustard
Instructions
- Fry up the bacon until it’s crispy but not completely burnt, keeping the grease in the pan. Chop the bacon into bits.
- Sauté the onion in the bacon grease — you want to cook the squishy crunch out of them, but not take them all the way to caramelization.
- Mix the onions, bacon, drained beans and everything else together in a large bowl, and bake uncovered at 350 °F for 1 hour in a 9″ x 9″ (23cm x 23cm) baking dish. If you’re scaling up the recipe, a 9″ x 13″ works well. In any case, stop baking when the texture has firmed up significantly from first having mixed the ingredients but bubbles are still burbling up from the lower layers.
- Let them cool in the pan and serve at room temperature.
The corn syrup can be further reduced to a quarter cup or half cup for a double batch.