2 cans baked beans
1/4 cup Maple Syrup (Or Karo Syrup or Molasses)
1/4 cup brown sugar (could use white sugar or diet sugar)
3 or 4 slices of bacon if you have it.
Mix all ingredients except bacon together and put in baking pan. Lay bacon across the stop. Bake at 350 for 1 hour.
You could really add anything you had. If you had potatoes, meat, or vegetables you just added them in with the above ingredients. If you didn’t have bacon-a little surgar across the top would do. Mom and Dad were working during the depression and she said she would make this dish with whatever they had. As we kids grew up she added vegetables because we would eat vegetables we wouldn’t normally eat because of the sweet taste. As my parents got in a better financial position she would only make this dish when we begged her. I still bake this dish today, the same way Mom did.
All those beans must have made for a…………musical…..home.
If you eat beans on a regular basis your body learns to digest them properly, and you don’t have gas problems. Same holds true for whole grains, cruciferous vegetables, and most other foods that tend to make you “musical.”
My mother makes a dish she calls prison beans. There isn’t a recipe, but the staple is obviously beans, she always used dry Pinto beans but just about any bean will do. Any kind of meat like ham bones, hocks, bacon, chicken or beef can be added. If we had bacon or any other fatty pork, she would start by rendering it down in the bottom of the pot and then add any vegetables like onions, celery, garlic or bell peppers that need to cook down. Once they were clarified she would pour in the water and beans. when they were about half done she would add potatoes, if they were small (she called them marbles) she would peel them and toss them in whole, big ones were cut into medium sized hunks. She kept it covered and made sure there was enough water to make plenty of juice. She always made corn bread to go with it. The Clabber girl recipe in a cast iron skillet, big enough to make it thin, and hot enough to make it crispy. Sometimes she would put a scoop of white rice in the middle of the bowl.
I’m making it right now, but the only “paupers” extras I had handy were fingerling potatoes and filet mignon
My 2 grandmothers in WVa had the best country cooking I ever tasted–I could totally picture them eating this. One tasty dish I remember from 30+ years ago was something one of them made called “city chicken.” How about a recipe for that? I remember that wooden sticks were involved, but that’s about it!