Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Food: Country Style Pinto Beans with Salt Bacon - Recipe and Tutorial

{Soupbeans with fatback} as we call them here in Kentucky are one of my FAVORITE meals. They are easy to make, cheap, and oh my.. so good!

I made these today so I figured I would show you how to make them too!

You will need:
One pound bag of dry pinto beans {soupbeans}
2-3 slices of salt bacon {fatback}
Cooking Oil
Salt/Pepper
Water

First you will want to pick through your beans and get out any that don't look too good as well as an occasional pebble. Then put them in a bowl and rinse them off. After draining the water, add clean water back into the bowl. Allow the beans to sit in the clean water overnight in the fridge.
The next morning, get your beans out of the fridge, drain the water, and rinse/drain one more time. Pour the beans into a crockpot. Top the beans with boiling water. Fill almost to the top.
Now add a drop of oil {maybe a teaspoon}, 2-3 pieces of salt bacon {fatback}, and salt/pepper to taste. Turn your crockpot on high, put the lid on and leave them be.
After about 6-8 hours they should be really soft {easily mash between your fingers} and look something like this. If so, they are ready to eat!

Once they are done, I like to leave them in the fridge overnight and eat them the next day warmed up. The juice is thicker and they just taste better, in my opinion. Mom is the total opposite. She won't eat them after the first day.
I like mine with ketchup, onion, and banana peppers in them. I like fried potatoes {taters}, salmon patties {mackerel not pink} and kraut {homemade} on the side. Michael eats his with mayo, onion, banana peppers, and corn bread. Mom and Dad just eat them with corn bread, onions and banana peppers.

How do you like yours?

Don't forget to make sweet cornbread to go with them.

8 comments:

Sunny said...

Sweet cornbread???? You aren't a Southener then. We people from the south do not like our cornbread sweet.

I'm from Arkansas and soupbeans to us are Great Northern beans. But pinto beans are a favorite also.

I've always wondered why they are called soup beans. Do younknow??

Alana Jo said...

Hey Ila, thanks for stopping by and taking time to comment.

Kentucky is only sometimes considered southern, but I'll claim it.

I've been right here in the hills and hollers of Kentucky my whole life so I'm country if not southern.

Variety is the spice of life, eh?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soup_beans

Soup beans is a term common in the Southern United States, particularly the regions around the Appalachian Mountains. It refers to pinto or other brown dried beans cooked with smoked pork as flavoring.1 Soup beans are usually served with cornbread, greens (such as boiled cabbage, cauliflower, or fried saurkraut and weenies), corn (whole or sweet), and potatoes (stewed or fried) and may be topped with raw chopped onions. The meal is often topped with pickle relish. Soup beans are considered a main course, but also serve as a side dish. In rural areas, where food was scarce during the winter, these dried beans were a staple food.[1]

dade said...

i love your post....i-tasik

Anonymous said...

Thank you SO much for posting a recipe for plain-old, down-home, Kentucky SOUP BEANS!! You wouldn't BELIEVE some of the weird so-called "southern-style" recipes I've found for them-- but one thing-- Sweet Cornbread is THE DEVIL!! LOL!! Thanks for the great recipe! :)

Anonymous said...

I am from the South, Tennessee, and we love our cornbread sweet. We love sweet tea. We eat pinto and
white beans. love your recipe and thanks for sharing.

Anonymous said...

I'm from Louisiana and we only eat sweet cornbread.

Lena said...

I was raised up the holler from Jo and I'll vouch for all of us being southern and full of variety. While Jo's family enjoys their sweet cornbread my family never sweetened the cornbread when I was younger. However, my mom now sweetens her cornbread. Oh and another rule at our house: Cornbread was never cut, our bread was only broken by hand. Thanks for the wonderful post Jo.

Unknown said...

Good soup bean recipe...I'm with a few others though on the cornbread, but a little different as well. When we make ours we fry it in a crisco greased skillet about like a pancake, but when you make your batter add about a teaspoon of salt to the mix. Really makes them soup beans POP!