One Pot Dinner

This is cowboy beans by another name: ground beef and bacon browned together with onions, then slow-cooked with pork and beans, kidney beans, brown sugar, liquid smoke, and white vinegar until everything melds into a thick, smoky, sweet-and-tangy pot of pure comfort. Set it in the morning, come home to dinner.

The liquid smoke is the ingredient that gives this a barbecue-pit flavor without an actual pit. One tablespoon infuses the entire pot with that deep, woodsy smokiness that usually takes hours over charcoal. Combined with the bacon and brown sugar, it creates a sauce that tastes like it was slow-smoked all day.

White vinegar is the counterbalance to all that sweetness. Without it, the brown sugar and beans would taste flat and one-note. The vinegar’s sharpness cuts through the richness and keeps every spoonful interesting instead of heavy.

Kitchen Tips

• Brown the beef and bacon separately and drain the fat. Skipping this step leaves a greasy slick on top of the finished beans that no amount of slow cooking fixes.
• Cook on low, not high. The long, gentle heat (4-9 hours) lets the flavors develop and the beans absorb all that smoky sweetness. High heat just boils them.
• Don’t drain the pork and beans. Their sauce adds body and flavor to the pot. The kidney beans get drained because their liquid is starchy and bland.
• This reheats beautifully and is actually better the next day after the flavors have concentrated overnight in the fridge.

Variations

• Add diced jalapenos for a spicier, Tex-Mex version.
• Stir in barbecue sauce (a quarter cup) instead of or alongside the liquid smoke for more depth.
• Use ground turkey and turkey bacon for a lighter version that still carries the smoky-sweet flavor.