Spanish Bean Dish

This Spanish bean dish is a vintage casserole with a wild ingredient list that adds up to something genuinely complex. Canned kidney beans get baked in stages, first low and slow with mustard, garlic, and a teaspoon of liquid smoke for backbone, then hotter under sliced onions, then doused with strong coffee, and finally splashed with brandy off the heat.

The coffee and brandy are the moves that turn this from baked beans into something special. The coffee adds bitter depth that balances the sweetness of the beans, and the brandy off the heat warms gently in the residual oven temperature, perfuming everything without burning off.

A half cup of pickle juice is the surprise acidity. It does what vinegar can’t, adding briny, slightly herbed sour notes that play against the smoke and dark richness in the pot.

Pro Tips

• Use a strong dark-roast coffee for the most pronounced flavor, weak coffee gets lost in the bake.
• Drain the kidney beans well, the canning liquid would dilute the carefully built flavor profile.
• Let the dish rest the full 15 minutes after the brandy goes in, this is when the alcohol mellows and folds into the beans.
• Bake in a heavy ceramic or cast-iron casserole, the slow even heat is part of how the beans transform.

Variations

• Add a quarter pound of crumbled cooked bacon or chopped chorizo for a meaty, smokier version.
• Skip the brandy and use whiskey or dark rum for a different finishing note.
• Stir in a tablespoon of brown sugar or molasses if you prefer baked beans on the sweeter side.