The Baked Bean Mystique

One of the most popular ways to consume beans is to bake them. People really like their baked beans; most of us swear by our favorite recipes. If you search the Web, you'll find hundreds, even thousands, of recipes for baked beans. There are almost as many ways to make them as there are cooks.

In the future, I will investigate this matter and report on what the differences are and whatever else I might learn from thoroughly immersing myself in baked bean lore. But that's in the future. Today, I am going to give you a pearl of great price, a valuable family secret: our family baked bean recipe. It's a winner. Let me tell you about it.

My mother used to whip up a batch of her favorite baked beans a couple times a year. They featured bacon and brown sugar and were always a hit. She taught me how to make them before I left home, but I can't recall actually making them back when I was a bachelor.

The Discovery of the Perfect Beans

Then I got married. There are thousands of great reasons why I'm happy I found the perfect woman to marry--she's a gem, I guarantee it. But, you know what? One unforeseen but significant reason to marry my way into the Rollins family is her mother's baked bean recipe. The first time I tasted these beans, I wondered where they had been all my life. They were glorious. They were different. They were delicious. I loved them.

I continue to love them. No important family meal ever happens without a pot of these great baked beans. Thanksgiving without the family baked beans? Unthinkable. A picnic without our special baked beans? Never. Company for dinner? Well, we might occasionally leave out the beans, but only if the guests have never had them and don't know what they're missing.

The Master Bean Baker

Soon, I started making the beans myself, so that we could take them to special meals on my side of the family. They were an instant hit. Among my relatives, no meal invitation is extended without a comment something like this: "And you'll bring your baked beans, of course." Of course. I seriously believe that we occasionally are invited solely on the strength of our baked beans.

As I became proficient (not a difficult task), my mother-in-law slowly let me become the one who always brings the baked beans to the family meals. (She knows how much I love to make them.) She--and other family members who shall remain nameless--also know they can count on my beans to be superb. When the aforementioned other family members make the beans using the same perfect recipe I use, the results cannot be counted on to be successful. That's because they don't pay attention to the recipe. They add extra cans of beans ("That doesn't look like enough beans; I think I'll just add some more pork 'n' beans..."), they make substitutions, they use inferior ingredients, and perhaps they just don't give the process the same loving care I do.

Whatever the reason, I'm the main bean baker for both sides of the family. (Or so I imagine....)

The Recipe

Now, after all this build up, maybe you'd be interested in tasting these beans for yourself. OK, I'm getting to that. Before we do, however, let's trace the history of this treasured recipe. It came to me from my mother-in-law, who got the recipe from a friend in Afghanistan some 35 or more years ago. (Yes, Afghanistan. We do not stint in trying to find the best recipes in the world for you.) Where the recipe came from before that we'll never know. I call these beans the Famous Rollins Baked Beans.

The secret of the Famous Rollins Baked Beans is the sausage. You use ground country pork sausage. To get exactly the right taste, you need exactly the right sausage. If you live in Utah, you can get exactly the right sausage at a local grocery chain, Harmons. Ask for the ground country sausage. If that isn't possible for you, audition the varieties of ground pork sausage available to you. Find one that really tastes good to you--not too bland, not too spicy, but flavorful--and you'll have the best baked beans known to man. (Or, at least, to Mann.) Among the national brands, the Jimmy Dean's country sausage is adequate. We haven't found a national brand that's superb.

OK, it's time for the recipe. I hope you are by this time properly excited about your good fortune in finding this recipe. It's in Part 2 of this article. (You'll get a tiny bit of repetition over in that article, because it was written and posted long before I added this background story.)

I hope you'll give these baked beans a try. Be careful with your ingredients, and you're apt to end up with a dish that will be wildly popular and will get you invited to all sorts of wingdings and shindigs that you've never been invited to before. Who would have thought you could buy popularity with baked beans?

This article, in slightly different form, appeared originally on my Bean Lovers' site on Suite 101 (it's still there).

Copyright © 2002 Richard Mann. All rights reserved. Please contact the author for permission to use this article (includes reprints in mailing lists, newsletters, and/or any other purpose/format) and give details of its proposed use. Any and all use of this article in any way without permission is prohibited under copyright law. Acceptable use: Please feel free to link to this page. Of course, you can always print these recipes for your own personal use (that's what they're here for).

366 Delicious Ways to Cook Rice, Beans, and Grains This excellent book, 366 Delicious Ways to Cook Rice, Beans, and Grains, gives you 366 recipes for healthful, delicious bean, rice, and grain dishes from all over the world. Yes, they're primarily vegetarian recipes, but the book does include variations on the recipes that use salmon, shrimp, and chicken. Mouthwatering ethnic recipes are mixed with other "natural gourmet" items that are fascinating to read, fun to prepare, and a delight to eat. How do Smoky Black Bean Burritos sound? Or how about Pesto Pasta with Cranberry Beans? I'm ready to start cooking right now.