Honey-Molasses Baked Beans

By Addie

This is a great recipe because there’s no sugar in it–many baked bean recipes call for brown sugar, but these beans are sweetened with unsulfured molasses, which is healthier (I also added a little honey). I’m a fan of both onion and bacon, so I was happy to see that these ingredients were part of the recipe, too. I decided to use turkey bacon to keep the recipe as healthy as I could, and that worked out (and tasted) great! If you are vegetarian, these beans would also be good without bacon.

So here’s my version of the recipe! It makes about 6 servings.

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup unsulfured molasses (you can use light or dark; I used dark)
• 1 Tablespoon honey
• 1/2 cup ketchup
• 1/4 cup honey mustard
• 3 cans (15 ounces each) Navy beans, drained and rinsed
• Salt and pepper, to taste
• 1 large onion, halved and sliced 1/4 inch thick
• 4 slices of bacon, sliced crosswise in 1/2″ wide pieces

Details

Adapted from nancycreative.com

Preparation

Step 1

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. In a medium bowl, combine molasses, honey, ketchup, and honey mustard. Add beans and season with salt and pepper, if desired. Mix ingredients to combine.

Transfer mixture to a 2 to 3–quart covered baking dish. Scatter onion slices over beans.……then lay cut pieces of bacon on top of the onion slices in a single layer, covering onion as completely as possible.

Cover casserole dish and bake for 30 minutes at 375 degrees. Then uncover the dish and bake an additional 30 to 40 minutes, until bacon is crispy (I baked mine an additional 40 minutes).

Let the beans sit in the casserole dish for about 5 minutes, then mix everything together well before serving. After mixing the beans, onion, and bacon together, the beans will look a little lighter in color (so don’t be alarmed if they seem a little dark when they come out of the oven.)

Serve beans immediately and enjoy! Makes 6 servings.