Baked beans

Slow cooking at its best. I like making this on a weekend to eat throughout the week. It cooks for a long time but doesn’t need much effort.

Ingredients:

• 400g dried white kidney beans (or other bean of your choice)
• water
• 3 cloves garlic, chopped
• 1 onion, chopped
• 1tbsp olive oil
• 400g tinned tomatoes
• dried basil
• 1/2 tsp paprika
• stock (if you don’t have any you can use water without any problems)
• 1tbsp maple syrup
• Salt & pepper

Method:

• Cover the kidney beans with plenty of water and soak for 24 hours (I usually do this on a Friday morning)
• Drain & cook the beans in fresh water until no longer hard (can take up to an hour)
• Heat oil in oven proof frypan or dish on medium heat
• Pre-heat oven to 150 degrees celsius
• Fry garlic and onion until fragrant
• Add tinned tomatoes, basil, paprika and cooked beans
• Stir until combined
• Cover with stock or water so the beans are covered with at least 3cm of liquid
• Cover with lid or foil and put in the oven
• Cook for 2 hours
• Stir and add salt & pepper to taste
• Add maple syrup
• Cook for another 1-2 hours depending on your patience, or until the liquid is thick & delicious

You can experiment a little with different herbs/spices. Sometimes I like to add cumin & chilli. You can also add chopped bacon if you eat meat.