Recipe: Boston Baked Beans

Boston Baked Beans
rec.food.cooking/J. Helman/2002

My mother's recipe is posted below. I cook this in a crock pot more often than I cook it in the oven. I have substituted bacon for salt pork, or left the meat out altogether. See the notes at the bottom for more information. Also, I've had no problems freezing the leftovers, and I've had no problems with soaking the beans overnight prior to cooking them in the crock pot.

1 lb. pea (navy) beans
1/2 lb. salt pork
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
4 tablespoons brown sugar
1/2 cup dark molasses
1 teaspoon dry mustard
4 tablespoons ketchup
1 minced onion
2 to 2 1/2 cups boiling water
2 tablespoons pickle relish
Vegetable oil

Wash beans. Take out any bad beans, put good beans in dish of water, cover, and soak overnight. (To ensure there is room for the beans to rehydrate, use a large bowl and cover the beans with an extra 2 or 3 inches of water.) Next day, take out any remaining bad beans. Parboil beans until skins begin to burst. Drain the water. Add all other ingredients to beans except salt pork. Cut salt pork into 1/4 inch cubes. Put beans and salt pork in baking dish or bean pot, alternating beans and salt pork in layers, with salt pork on bottom and top. Put in cold oven. Turn oven on to 350 Fahrenheit and cook approximately 5 hours, adding water and vegetable oil as necessary to keep beans from drying.

Option 1 (Vegetarian): Delete all meat and mix two or three additional tablespoons of vegetable oil into the bean mixture.

Option 2 (Crock Pot): Use only as much water as is needed to almost cover beans. Cook on low all day or on high for at least 6 hours. Before serving, cook 1/2 to 1 hour uncovered on high (to thicken beans). For crock pot vegetarian beans, use a total of only one or two tablespoons of vegetable oil, for beans with salt pork, use no vegetable oil.