The Magical Fruit

I made baked beans.

From scratch. Like, complete scratch, soaked the beans overnight and everything.

I found the recipe while leisurely reading American Food Writing, by Molly O'Neill. The "recipe" was part of someone's work, and here I will translate the recipe so that you too can make it at home (it's really easy, and so incredibly delicious):

Ingredients

4 cups white [great northern] beans, soaked overnight

1 lb (16 ounces) salt pork [I used bacon]

1 large onion, peeled and quatered

1 heaping teaspoon mustard

1/2 cup dark molasses

1 teaspoon black pepper

water to cover beans

1/2 tablespoon salt, divided [more or less to taste]

I quartered this recipe, but accidentally added 1/4 cup molasses instead of 1/8. It turned out incredible, but I'm a fan of sweet, and I topped the finished beans with plain Greek yogurt. I could imagine them being just as tasty if only half as sweet, however. The first time I tried baked beans hen I was growing up, they were ones that my mom had made. The moment the first mouthful passed my lips, I thought they were...disgusting. They were out of a can, but this is not why they were gross to me the first time around. I had expected the beans to be savory. They were sweet. A very interesting, complex sweet, not your standard, confectionary, cupcake-frosting sparkly sweet, but also tangy, pungent, sour, salty. All five flavors in one dish, a balanced food.With the balanced nutrient content of the beans themselves, plus the energetics of the other various ingredients, we have here a surprisingly simple, ambrosial tonic dish that everyone will enjoy...if they know what to expect ;)

Instructions:

Place beans in large bowl, cover with 2 inches of water. Soak overnight. In the morning, discard water and place beans in heavy-bottomed saucepan (or whatever you have that most closely resembles this setup) and cover with 2 inches of fresh cold water. Heat until a white scum forms on the entire surface of the water. Remove beans from heat and strain. Into an ovenproof casserole (with a lid. I used my cast iron one.), place the onion and pork [bacon]. Then pour in the beans to cover the first 2 ingredients. Add molasses, mustard, and pepper. Pour in boiling water to cover ingredients by 1-1/2 inches. Cover and place in a "slow oven" (I set mine at 300-350). Here the original "recipe" instructs us to wait 2 hours, then add salt mixed with 1 cup boiling water to the bean mixture. Then, every hour thereafter (according to the original instructions, we started this entire process at 5AM) we would add i cup of water to compensate for whatever had evaporated, or something. I chose to start my beans at 5:30PM. So at 7:30PM, I checked on the beans (having also checked on them about 3 times up until the 2 hour mark) and added roughly 1-1/2 teaspoons of sea salt (eyeballed it). Stirred the mixture and replaced the cover. Cooked until about 9:00PM, then removed from oven and placed on the stove uncovered to thicken the liquid portion, kept at a simmer for about an hour. Then, added a bit more water, maybe 1/3 cup, covered and replaced in oven set at 200 degrees until 3:30AM. The results were nothing short of delectable perfection. The addition of sour cream or plain yogurt (preferably organic, as dairy is one of the most important products it is crucial to consume only organic versions of) is a fantastic addition.

Happy baked beans!

And, for you further reading pleasure, here is the medicinal value of baked beans [from scratch]:

Great northern white beans:

Onion:

Pork:

Salt:

Mustard:

Black pepper:

Molasses: