On Sat, 16 Jan 2016 23:03:43 -0800 (PST), dsi1 >
wrote:

>On Thursday, January 14, 2016 at 1:45:38 PM UTC-10, Dave Smith wrote:
>> I had success in the search for nay beans the other day. I was in a
>> grocery store to pick up a few things and looked for beans. I not only
>> found them... they were on sale. So I made a batch of baked beans
>> today. Unlike my very unsuccessful bean venture more than 30 years ago,
>> they were delicious. This recipe called for a pound of bacon, a
>> jalapeno pepper and a half tsp. of Cayenne pepper. I didn't have fresh
>> jalapeno so I used to pickled jalapenos. Given the volume of beans and
>> liquid, much of which was absorbed by the beans, they were surprisingly
>> hot.
>
>The beans I made in the slow-cooker were pretty good.
>The main problem was that the bacon turned awful after
>12 or so hours of cooking. It turned into a dark fibrous material.
>The beans however, were fine. I used 2lbs of bacon for one pound of beans.

That proportion would produce a swamp of fat. The bacon is for adding
its disgusting artificial smoke flavor (most commercially packaged
bacon contains artificial smoke flavoring), 2-3 rashers would be
sufficient... more bacon won't make it smokier but will make it a
whole lot saltier, do you have any concept of how much salt is in two
pounds of bacon? One regular thickness slice of bacon contains 82 mg
sodium *after pan frying and drained*... tossed raw into your bean pot
you can triple the sodium.... but even if you pan fry and drain two
pounds of bacon it would add about 5,000 mg of sodium. add it raw and
you're adding about 15,000 mg sodium. Either way you'd be rendering
your puny one pound of dried beans inedible. One of the easiest ways
to add smoke flavor to a pound of dried beans is to add two tube
steaks. But I much prefer a smoked ham hock, adds little salt and
little fat. There are several cottage industry smoke houses around
here that supply the markets... during hunting season they make up
tons of venison sausage, but they smoke all kinds of game, and also
pork. They make excellent products, all naturally smoked with local
hardwoods.

>This morning I put a chuck roast into the slow-cooker and let it run.
>It was great. The meat was injected with a solution of water, salt,
>garlic powder, MSG, and shoyu and cooked for 10 hours.

Huh... why does meat that's slow cooked for ten hours need to be
injected... simply add the seasonings to the pot.

>I might cook more beans tomorrow. This time, I won't add the
>bacon until the beans are almost done.

Better with no bacon... to a pound of beans one smoked ham hock will
be far better... rather than all that salty fat it's gelatinous
goodness will melt into the beans.