Sweet and Sour Baked Beans

Adapted from my mother-in-law’s recipe collection. Captain OCD’s sister makes these often and they are a big favorite wherever she brings them. You can use whatever kind of beans you like, but because they bake for a long time, they should be fairly sturdy (green beans wouldn’t work well).

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Sweet and Sour Baked Beans

Not your typical sweet-and-sour baked beans. You will think two large onions are too much and so will be reluctant to use four. Two is not too many.

Course vegetable

Prep Time 15 minutes

Cook Time 2 hours

Total Time 2 hours 15 minutes

Ingredients

Beans

• 2 cans lima beans
• 1 can kidney beans
• 2 cans white beans
• 1 can black beans
• 1 can pinto beans
• 1 pound bacon
• 2-4 Large onions cut into about 1-inch chunks

Sauce

• 2 cups brown sugar firmly packed
• 1 cup apple-cider vinegar
• 3 teaspoons dry mustard
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 2 tablespoons corn starch mixed in about 1/4 of cold water
• dash hot pepper sauce or cayenne pepper, to taste

Optional, to make it a meal

• Small sliced sausages or hot dogs or ground cooked sausage

Instructions

Beans

1. In a large frying pan (an electric frying pan works best - that's a lot of onions), fry bacon until crisp.
2. Remove bacon, drain, and crumble (leave bacon grease in pan). Set bacon aside.
3. Add onions to the bacon grease and cook for a few minutes until they start to soften.

Sauce

1. Into frying pan with the bacon grease and onions, stir in vinegar, sugar, dry mustard, salt, and garlic powder.
2. Cook over medium heat for about 10 minutes, until sauce has reduced a bit.
3. Add the cornstarch/water and cook for another minute or two.

Put it all together

1. Drain all the beans and dump into a casserole dish.
2. Add onions, sauce, bacon, and sausage/hot dogs (if you're using those).
3. Bake uncovered at 350 for about an hour and half, until hot and bubbly.