We fry chopped bacon rashers in the saucepan then add the baked beans, heat well, and serve on multigrain toast with freshly ground pepper & salt, and sriracha sauce on top.
We cook enough for several breakfasts and simply reheat some of the mixture in the microwave the following mornings.
We ate them for breakfast yesterday and today and we have enough left for tomorrow.
Good baked beans, esp ‘Boston Baked Beans’ are great side dishes for American BBQ to compliment coleslaw and corn on cob.
The American expectation for baked beans is any meal except brekkie. Of the canned varieties Bush’s (American product, at Woolies) was for us far better than anything else on the shelves but have since been discontinued. Heinz is full of themselves and ordinary and SPC is overly tomato for our taste. We add some brown sugar and molasses, amounts depending on the meal.
The choices in the Choice question reflect that Americans and Australians eat beans for different meals, and thus rightly expect different base flavours to suit.
You are in luck as I have found a retailer of Bush’s Baked Beans in Melbourne.
And only $4.99 a can.
As for the question of whether baked beans are eaten at breakfast or later in the day, the classic comedy western provides the definitive answer for the USA.
We buy most brands and no name brands. For cooking with other things prefer the ham sauce flavoured varieties and sometimes the BBQ flavoured sauce ones. Cooked with bacon, onion, mexican chilli powder, a dash of worcesstershire sauce and some maple syrup or hickory/smoky flavour sauce makes a great easy meal.
Cold from the can, and in a sandwich, also cold. Don’t like them heated. As for brands, it always used to be SPC or Heinz for me, but I bought some Coles brand cheapie some time ago and now prefer those. go figure.
We have a split household - I like SPC and my husband will only eat Heinz (English recipe) because as a Pom ‘Heinz means beans’ - just goes to show that advertising slogan/campaign had a long reach. It is still his catch cry in any conversation about BB and he’s now 70 years old! Our favourite is either on hot buttered toast, or on top of a soft poached egg sunny side up on toast. Great rescue when it’s late and I don’t want to cook
Don’t waste my Choice subscription on a taste and use (less) test. I’m not paying my subscription to find out how everyone else eats baked beans (Phaseolus vulgaris). I just want to know whose beans I should be eating to save the planet. A life cycle analysis. Country of origin of beans, environmental consequences of growing, canning and shipping them, Australian vs overseas ownership of the company i.e who profits from my bean feasts (SPC Australian, Heinz overseas?), from where do Coles, Woollies procure their brand beans? Chemical additives that make me younger and stronger (salt free but sugar strong?)… Please take the lid off the Pandora’s Box of baked beans so we can give maximum support to Australian products if they are good for us and our our country.
Choice does take the lid off many products. (No pun intended.) You raise some principles concerning the ownership of brands, the origin/contents of products and the footprint of products. Without judging what is best or better, being able to judge a product choice on some or all of these factors is important to many.
With baked beans, and many other products we all have our preferences. We subscribe to Choice to be better informed. It works for us. This forum is a great opportunity to constructively provide input.
True, not everyone eats baked beans. But then not everyone uses disposable baby nappies, cots, strollers, and many other products or services that Choice has put the spotlight on. Hopefully there is room for both select and the broader needs of the community to be considered, even where the benefit is not for all.
One has to wonder about the economics when product can be sourced from a high dollar country, shipped to the EU for ‘manufacturing’ (processing and canning?) and then on to Australia and sell for about 2/3 the price of a local name brand, all grown and ‘manufactured’ locally.