Smoked Baked Beans (with Bacon!)

These beans are the best

I love making these easy baked beans from start to finish in my smoker. The smoked bacon is the BEST way bacon can be cooked. Then cooking the onion and peppers in the bacon fat... yeah, you get the point.

How to make baked beans

Let's get started making these great tasting beans. I'm going to walk you through this recipe step by step so they turn out perfect!

I'm using canned pork and beans instead of soaking and cooking raw beans because it's EASY and tastes GREAT!

How to cook baked beans

Place a cast iron pan in the smoker and bring the temperature up to 425°F. I'm using my pellet smoker, like this Traeger Pro Series, when making these smoked beans and it works fantastic. A traditional offset smoker like this Oklahoma Joe's will also work great when smoking these beans.

My favorite wood chunks or wood pellets to use are cherry or apple. These smoked beans are very receptive to all wood types though. Hickory and pecan also work well.

Bacon

Once the smoker is heated and holding steady at 425°F, add the bacon to the pan and cook until a couple minutes before it's crispy. Bacon will take this smoked baked beans recipe over the top with flavor!

Leaving it a little bit underdone will make sure it doesn't burn when we put it on top of the beans and smoke later. Make sure to cook the bacon in the cast iron pan, we need the bacon fat for cooking the onions and peppers.

Sauté the onions & peppers

After removing the bacon from the cast iron, add the chopped onions and peppers and cook until translucent, about 5 minutes. At this point if you are using a pellet smoker, turn the smoker OFF. If using an offset smoker, lower the temperature to around 250°F.

The reason the smoker needs to be off is because we are going to have the lid open for a little and we don't want the auger to keep pumping pellets into the fire box when we need to lower the temperature and smoke these beans in a couple minutes.

Add the rest

Open those cans of pork and beans and add them to the cast iron of sautéed onions and peppers. Continue to add the remaining ingredients, all but the bacon. Stir everything together so it's very well mixed.

That bacon should have cooled by now, so crumble it into 1" bacon pieces and then top the smoked bean mixture with the bacon.

How to smoke baked beans

Now it's time to turn the smoker back on at 250°F and smoke the beans for about another 45 minutes. This should give the beans a great barbeque smoke flavor and finish cooking that bacon on top.

That's all there is to smoked beans. Just make sure to use a pot holder or towel when taking that cast iron pan off the smoker, it's gonna be hot! These pair great with a juicy Smoked Burger or a fellow side dish to Smoked Mac n Cheese. Enjoy!

Video - Step by step

FAQ

Try smoking this!

Old pro tips

• Make sure to not cook the bacon all the way before topping the beans, otherwise it will become burnt
• Apple or cherry works best with beans
• Garnish with parsley or cilantro to put a little color into the beans