The Beezo Bowl: Baked Beans

My dinner tonight? Baked beans and corn muffins! Talk about a perfect (solitary) meal.

I started out with 1.5 cups of dried beans. As you can tell, I have a variety in there. Pinto, Black, Northern White, Kidney, and Cranberry beans. I cooked them at a slow boil for about 2 hours, then threw in about 2 cups of frozen crinkle cut carrots and 1 cup of frozen diced onions, then boiled another 7 minutes and drained it all. I then preheated the oven to 325F and greased a large baking dish (with a lid if possible, or wrapped with tin foil). In a separate bowl, I combined 3/4 cup (ideal) brown sugar, 1/2 cup ketchup, 1 TBS apple cider vinegar, 1 TBS yellow mustard, 1/4 cup crumbled bacon, 1 tsp maple syrup extract, and several cups water (as it cooks, you may have to add more water. I started with 2 and added 1 cup later).

Everything set to be combined into deliciousness.

Meet my beans. Aren't they fabulous?

I mixed everything up in my baking pan, sealed it tight, then put it in the oven. All the recipes online told me I should bake for about 3 hours. I kept peaking at it, though, and finally got so hungry that I had to sneak some out for dinner. It was great, but still needed a bit of time to soften up. The beans are currently back in the oven with some extra water. I served my huge scoop full of beans with fresh corn muffins. (See my corndog recipe. Add 2 TBS frozen corn for each 3 TBS of corn meal mix)