Baked beans
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Baked beans is a recipe consisting of beans in baked format (sometimes stewed) in a sauce.
Traditional cuisines of many regions claim such recipes as typical specialities, for example:
- Boston baked beans
- Jersey bean crock
- Guernsey bean jar
- Cassoulet
- Feijoada
- New England baked beans
- Quebec-style baked beans are often prepared with maple syrup.
- British cuisine claims beans on toast as a teatime favourite, and baked beans may form part of a Full English breakfast
- Beans cooked in Barbecue sauce (or a similarly flavored sauce) are a traditional side-dish in U.S. barbecue.
Most commercial tinned baked beans such as Heinz are made from navy beans, a variety of Phaseolus vulgaris, and sold in a sauce (in the United Kingdom, it is chiefly tomato sauce). Tinned baked beans are often mistakenly thought of as haricot beans (for example, [1]), but Heinz describes their product as "Canadian navy beans" [2], which are very similar to haricots but slightly larger. Also, baked beans should not be confused with Pork and Beans which are also navy beans in tomato sauce, but are not sweetened with brown sugar or flavored with onions like baked beans.
The popularity of baked beans may be due to the fact they are cheap to make and buy. In the United Kingdom, for example, supermarkets may sell store brand baked beans for less than 10p a tinned can, but some premium organic brands may be as expensive as £1.50[3]. Baked beans have also recently started appearing with other foods, such as inside sausages, with bacon, or on pizza.
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[edit] Regional variations
In the US, Bush's is the top producer of baked beans, and the company produces several flavors. Most of these products are in a very sweet sauce with little tang. By comparison, home made baked beans are considerably tangier. In the U.S. state of Vermont baked beans usually are sweetened with Vermont Maple syrup. As you move south down the eastern coast of the US, the beans become tangier, usually due to the addition of yellow mustard. Ground beef also becomes common alongside bacon in these beans. They take on a flavor similar to Cowboy Beans, a similar dish popular in America.
In the United Kingdom, Heinz is the top selling brand of baked beans. There are substantial differences between the Heinz baked beans sold in the UK and the nearest equivalent US product (Heinz Premium Vegetarian Beans). The US beans contain brown sugar where the British beans do not. The US product contains a total of 14g of sugar per can compared to 7g for the British version (equating to 140 vs 90 calories per tin). The US beans also possess a mushier texture and are darker in colour than their UK counterpart.
[edit] History
The recipe for baked beans may be based on a Native American dish in which beans were cooked with bear fat and maple syrup in an earthenware pot. European settlers may have adapted this recipe, using pork fat and molasses.
According to alternative traditions, sailors brought cassoulet from the south of France, or the regional bean stew recipes from northern France and the Channel Islands.
Most probably, a number of regional bean recipes coalesced and cross-fertilised in North America and ultimately gave rise to the baked bean culinary tradition familiar today.
The Heinz company markets their product in the UK under the name "Baked Beanz", in reference to a 1960s advertisement campaign which used the slogan "Beanz Meanz Heinz".
In October 2005, Premier Foods Plc launched Branston Baked Beans. The marketing and promotion of this product was aimed squarely at challenging Heinz's dominance of the UK baked bean market. Promotional activities included a 'Great British Bean Poll' where members of the public across the country were invited to blind taste both 'the brand leader' (assumed to be Heinz) and Branston. 76% of participants picked Branston over the brand leader. Heinz was subsequently obliged to re-evaluate its advertising strategy in the face of this aggressive activity, although in public Heinz spokespeople dismissed the challenge as a 'non-starter'.
A popular rhyme among children involving beans goes as follows:
"Beans, beans, Good for your heart. The more you eat, The more you fart. The more you fart, The better you feel. So eat your beans at every meal!"
[edit] Health
In 2002 the British Dietetic Association allowed manufacturers of canned baked beans to advertise the product as contributing to the recommended five daily allowance of vegetables per person. This concession was criticised by heart specialists who pointed to the high levels of sugar and salt in the product. Some manufacturers produce a "healthy option" version of the product with lower levels of sugar and salt.
[edit] Bean wars
In the mid to late 1990s in the United Kingdom, a 'war' broke out among leading supermarket retailers, in which the price of store branded beans was heavily reduced. In some cases, supermarkets briefly gave customers a penny per tin of beans to take them away, although this offer was limited to three tins per customer. Understandably, such deals were particularly popular with students and low-income families. Although prices have risen since then, the 'war' is arguably responsible for the continuing low prices of this staple product in the UK (for example, as of 2006 Asda sells its Smart Price beans at 17p). The reason for the price reduction was not only to get customers to buy baked beans but also to encourage the consumption of the products that would accompany it, such as bread, margarine, butter, and cheese, which have higher profit margins.
