Slow Cooker Baked Beans

Zesty spicy baked beans with bits of jalapenos and hearty beef produce the most incredible bounce of flavors that light up your tongue. Perfect as a side dish for ribs and burgers, these “Sloppy” beans are transformed in the slow cooker. As a bonus – this recipe is simple and requires no soaking or boiling of beans!

BBQ BEANS GROCERY LIST

Below are the ingredients to make these slow cooker spicy baked beans. Please scroll to the bottom of the post for a printer friendly version of this with full step by step instructions.

• canned baked beans – You will need (4) 15oz cans of your favorite baked beans brand. Personally partial to Bush’s Baked Beans.
• white onion
• ground beef – one pound of ground beef or ground sirloin
• jarred jalapenos – Need half a cup of chopped jalapenos, this can easily be substituted for fresh jalapenos if preferred
• barbecue sauce – The entire flavor of the baked beans relies on what BBQ sauce is added, so use a brand you are familiar with and love the results of. I personally enjoy Sweet Baby Ray’s and Sticky Fingers
• brown sugar
• garlic powder
• chili powder
• hot sauce

Slow Cooked Spicy Baked Beans

These beans start from a can and finish with their own unique taste perfect as a BBQ side dish. Using canned baked beans help eliminate the long process of soaking beans overnight and give the same texture that everyone is used to, do not be fooled!

Adding additional herbs and spices, hearty ground beef and sweet brown sugar really dials them up a notch and makes them the BEST baked beans. Plus, the entire beans recipe preps quite quickly in a slow cooker and stays warm all day, ready to serve when needed.

Dem Der Beans are Spicy!

Please note that this slow cooker baked beans has KICK! It’s made with tons of amazing flavor but does have more spice than the average baked beans.

If you want to cut down on spice, simply eliminate some hot sauce, chili powder and jalapenos. The longer those spices sit in a slow cooker together, the spicier/hotter they tend get.

Prep Ingredients

• Prep beef by cooking up on stove and draining of all excess grease. This recipe is also great if you want to use left over beef from previous beef recipes that you may have!
• Chop onion into bite sized pieces.
• If using canned jalapenos, drain and chop into pieces. If using fresh jalapeno, wash and dice into bite sized pieces.

Is there a good substitution for ground beef in baked beans?

If you want to skip the ground beef (I can’t imagine why!) try adding chunks of ham or lots of uncooked bacon (if you add cooked bacon it will get tough).

Prep BBQ Sauce

Combine BBQ sauce, sugar, garlic powder, chili powder and hot sauce into a bowl and whisk till all ingredients are incorporated.

NOTE: You can just dump the ingredients straight into the slow cooker as well and mix, but having done it both ways, my RECOMMENDED way is to create and mix the BBQ sauce FIRST and then add to slow cooker. This ensures even spice distribution.

Slow Cook BBQ Baked Beans

Add beef, prepped BBQ sauce mixture, 4 cans of beans, jalapenos, and chopped onions into a crock pot. Stir to mix all together.

Cover and heat on high in slow cooker for 2 hours or low for 4-5 hours.

Always stir prior to serving.

What are baked beans best served with?

Most commonly, baked beans are served with burgers and ribs as a main dish and other common BBQ side dishes like coleslaw, Watergate salad, ambrosia salad and a delicious pasta salad like Pesto Pasta.

Are these baked beans spicy?

Spice is such a personal thing. After all, not all of our taste buds or tolerance is even remotely the same thing. I would personally consider any dish with hot sauce, garlic, onion and jalapenos to err on the side of zesty or spicy. However, the brown sugar and BBQ sauce (depending on what flavors you pick) really tone the dish as well. If you want a less spicy alternative, leave out jalapenos or lesson hot sauce.