Easy Honey Baked Bean Recipe – Slow Cooker

This baked bean recipe gives you tender, flavorful beans with a lightly sweet honey flavor, all with the convenience of the slow cooker. It’s an easy make ahead side dish for summer cookouts, potlucks, or family dinners. With plenty of variations and an option to make it vegetarian, this could easily be a main dish as well!

I love  making slow cooker baked beans – throw all the ingredients in the crockpot, set to cook, and you’ll have delicious beans ready when you are! The flavors all meld together into that sweet-tart flavor we all know and love without any extra monitoring from me.

Baked beans are such a great side dish for meats, burgers, and any cookout, really. But they are also a main dish on their own – with or without the bacon. A comforting bowl of baked beans served with a salad is both frugal and delicious.

Are beans good for you?

Beans are a great source of protein, complex carbs, and fiber (and according to this article, almost all Americans fail to eat enough fiber).

Dry beans also contain a healthy amount of nutrients including antioxidants, vitamins, and minerals such as copper, folate, iron, magnesium, manganese, phosphorous, potassium and zinc.

Let’s make this baked bean recipe

This recipe is e.a.s.y. It’s basically 3 steps:

Amount of Sugar: While many baked bean recipes are loaded with sugar, this recipe calls for ketchup and to make this as healthy as possible, I use my homemade honey sweetened ketchup. Then add just a little more honey (or maple syrup, for a Maple Baked Beans variation), for slightly sweet baked beans that you know is going to be way better than any canned stuff. AND, you can adjust the levels of sweetness to your tastes even more.

TIP: To make this recipe even easier, the recipe starts with cooked beans. I use cooked and frozen dry beans because it takes just a few minutes of hands on time and they are just as convenient as canned beans, but a lot cheaper. Using canned beans is fine, though – use whatever works for you!

What type of beans are baked beans?

You can use any kind of bean you’d like to, really, but traditionally baked beans are made with a white bean like navy beans. I like to use what I have, so for this recipe I used mainly white beans and filled in with some pinto beans and kidney beans. Sometimes it’s nice to have different types of beans. Again, it’s totally up to you.

We like our beans a little dryer so there’s not a ton of bean juice oozing over the whole plate at BBQs, but if you’d like your beans saucier, it’s simple to add a bit more water. It’s also simple to add tomato paste if you’d like them to be more tomato-saucy. It’s just so easy to customize to your tastes!

Can you freeze homemade baked beans?

Yes! You can freeze baked beans just like you can any cooked bean. After cooling, transfer the beans to small freezer containers making sure to leave 1-2 inches for expansion. Label and freeze for up to 6 months.

I hope you make these to enjoy at your next get together – I think you’ll love the flavor without the extra sugar, and how easy they are. Plus, using a slow cooker means no hot oven or worrying about enough space on the stove, which is always nice at parties, and I find they’re easier to transport for potlucks, too.

More easy side dishes

• Creamy Fresh Baked Corn Recipe
• Tuscan White Bean Salad
• Real Food Slow Cooker Cheesy Garlic Scalloped Potatoes

 

This recipe has been updated – it was originally published in May of 2013.