Meat Lovers Baked Beans
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This is no wimpy bean recipe! These Meat Lovers Baked Beans are hearty – made with bratwurst, thick-cut bacon, and smoky heat from paprika that mingles perfectly with the sweetness of Dorothy Lynch Dressing & Condiment and raw honey. Serve them up with anything you pull off the grill or make a whole meal out of them!
Grilling fans unite! It’s Sum-sum-SUMMERTIME and that means some much-needed patio time after a long winter and a rainy spring. Today’s recipe for Meat Lovers Baked Beans is going to be your new favorite side dish, and those leftovers will make an amazing lunch the next day all on their own!
Serve them up with a sandwich like these Crock Pot Pulled Pork Sandwiches topped with Dorothy Lynch Coleslaw or the famous Sloppy Dorothy for a great weeknight meal. Or gather the whole extended family around for a cookout and serve them with Dorothy’s BBQ Pork Chops or a Juicy Lucy Burger!
This post is sponsored by Nebraska’s own Dorothy Lynch Dressing & Condiment, but my love of their product and the opinions stated here are all my own.
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Why are these Meat Lovers Baked Beans So Good?
You may be thinking, “why are these baked beans better than anything I have made, or I can buy in a can?” Let me tell you, the ingredients in them just work so well together. I have my go-to bean recipe, just like you maybe do. My Grandma’s Pork ‘n Beans are what I grew up eating.
Now my husband’s family, always ate baked beans just warmed up straight from the can. I thought with his love of Dorothy Lynch, and all things barbecue, doctoring up a can of baked beans with his favorites? Brilliant. And I was right!
Things to Love About this Baked Beans Recipe with Brats & Bacon
- The flavor! Adding meat to baked beans is a game-changer. I have forever added bacon, but the baked beans with brats? Then things only get better with the addition of Dorothy Lynch Home Style Dressing & Condiment, giving it a sweet and slightly tangy taste that cannot be duplicated.
- They are easy to make! There are no crazy ingredients or spice blends. Just a few basic ingredients mixed into canned baked beans.
- So versatile! You can prepare this bean recipe on your stovetop, in your oven or slow cooker, or even on the grill or smoker!
- Great potluck recipe! They make enough to feed a crowd as a side dish at your next get-together but are easily halved to enjoy at your next family meal, too.
Ingredients in Dorothy’s Meat Lovers Baked Beans
This recipe only gets better when you find out there is nothing complicated or fancy about it. You will need:
- Bratwurst – choose whatever kind you enjoy eating. Beer brats, original or even spicy. I used original brats for this recipe.
- Bacon – I like a nice thick-cut smoky bacon.
- Canned Baked Beans – don’t choose anything that is already flavored. Just get plain old baked beans.
- Onion – I used yellow.
- Paprika – I used smoky paprika, but regular would be just fine.
- Honey – I always reach for local raw honey when I purchase honey.
- Dorothy Lynch Home Style Dressing & Condiment – There is no substitute!
How to make Baked Beans
Begin by frying your bacon in the bottom of a cast iron Dutch oven. Remove it and set it on a plate lined with paper towels. Drain the grease from the pan, but don’t wash it.
Add the onion and sliced bratwurst to the pan. Cook until the brats are almost done. Sprinkle with paprika and complete cooking.
De-glaze your pan and remove any black bits from the bottom. Add in all of the ingredients and give it a stir. Return it to the stovetop and cook for about 30 minutes or so, until beans are thickened and heated through, stirring occasionally.
Cooking Options for Baked Beans
To cook the meat lovers baked beans in your crockpot, once the meat is cooked, add everything to your slow cooker and cook on low for 4-6 hours.
The same goes for making them in the oven. Mix everything together and place it in the oven on 350 for about 30 minutes.
Prepare the beans on your grill or smoker the same way you do on the stovetop, but the grill will give them a nice smoky flavor, and keep all of the cooking outdoors.
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Tell me more about Dorothy Lynch?
Dorothy Lynch Dressing & Condiment can best be described as a sweet and spicy dressing that has a thick and creamy texture. Because of its color, many will assume it’s just another French dressing, but that simply isn’t true at all.
In fact, it tastes nothing like it. French dressing is oil-based; Dorothy Lynch is tomato-based. The best word to describe its taste: Homemade.
“The” Dorothy Lynch created her signature dressing in the 1940s and served it at a restaurant she and her husband ran at the local Legion Club in St. Paul, Nebraska. The dressing became so popular, patrons would bring in their own bottles to have Dorothy fill them to eat at home.
Dorothy Lynch is so Versatile – It’s not “just another salad dressing”
Even though Dorothy Lynch started out as a salad dressing, it is so much more versatile than that. We go through it quickly because we use it for all sorts of things!
It’s delicious as a marinade, a vegetable dip, a pizza dip, and it’s excellent with barbecue and fried chicken. Dorothy Lynch Home Style and Dorothy Lynch Light & Lean are both gluten-free.
Dorothy Lynch can be purchased at many locally-owned Nebraska shops and at select grocery stores around the country including Walmart and Hy-Vee. It can also be purchased online on their website and at Buy Nebraska.
USING DOROTHY LYNCH HOME STYLE DRESSING & CONDIMENT IN RECIPES
My most recent Dorothy recipe was for this super yummy Potato Salad! I think your next cookout would be extra memorable if you made Dorothy’s Potato Salad and Dorothy’s Meat Lovers Baked Beans!
More Recipes That Use Dorothy Lynch:
- Taco Salads with Dorothy’s Homemade Taco
- Dorothy’s Cranberry Meatballs
- Dorothy’s Pizza Pockets
- Dorothy’s Slow Cooker Glazed Ham
- Juicy Dorothy Burger (Juicy Lucy Burgers done better)
- Dorothy’s Hot Taco Dip
- Sloppy Dorothy Sandwiches
- Dorothy’s Cheesy Bacon Pull-Apart Bread
- Slow Cooker Pulled Pork Sandwiches with Dorothy’s Cole Slaw
- Dorothy’s BBQ Pork Chops
- Dorothy’s Impossible Pie with Bacon & Swiss
See even MORE ways to enjoy Dorothy Lynch in recipes on their website!
Let’s make some Meat Lovers Baked Beans! 
Meat Lovers Baked Beans
Equipment
Ingredients
- 8 slices thick cut smoked bacon cut into pieces
- 2 bratwurst sliced
- 1/2 cup onion chopped
- 1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika
- 2 28 ounce cans baked beans (original style) drain off liquid
- 1/4 cup raw honey
- 1/2 cup Dorothy Lynch Home Style Dressing & Condiment
Instructions
- In a dutch oven, fry the bacon until cooked through. Transfer to a paper towel lined plate to drain off the grease.
- Soak up the grease from the dutch oven with paper towels, but don't clean the pan. Add in the onion and sliced brats. When bratwurst is almost cooked through, sprinkle with paprika and continue to cook until meat is done. Remove from the pan and set aside.
- Deglaze the pan and remove any of the black burnt bits in the bottom before adding in the remaining ingredients.
- To the pan, add in all of the remaining ingredients, plus bacon and meat and onion mixture and cook on medium low heat until heated through.
Wow! You’ve definitely brought baked beans to a whole new level! Can’t wait to try 🙂
Bratwurst is my favorite thing ever! Never thought of mixing it with beans, wow this was incredible. Adding this to my weekly rotation!
Two of my favorite summer foods – bratwursts and baked beans – combined into one incredibly delicious dish! Genius recipe!
Looks so good! I love that you are adding meats to the beans, meat lovers will really enjoy this dish.
Never tried Dorothy Lynch, looks interesting!
My family is full of meat lovers for sure, and they would all love this meat lovers baked beans. I can’t wait to try it this week, thank you!
Enjoyed this with dinner tonight and it did not disappoint! So bold and hearty; paired perfectly with our meal and my whole family loved it!
I never thought of mixing meat in beans before. This looks so delicious and very yummy! My hubby and kids are going to really enjoy this recipe! I can’t wait to make this soon.
I haven’t tried this before but this is my dad’s favorite! Can’t wait to share this to him. Thank you!
I have been making a version of these baked beans for years…always with some type of meat…kielbasa, little smokies, hot dogs, hot Italian sausage. Liquid smoke is my secret ingredient…tastes like the beans were cooked low and slow over a campfire. I don’t know that we have Dorothy Lynch available, but I suppose it is like a slaw dressing??? Sounds interesting and I am anxious to try!
For some reason, I have always been intimidated by adding liquid smoke. I knew someone that used to overdo it, and I just never got past it! I have made these on the Traeger and loved that extra smoke they had, though! Maybe I will try that! Dorothy Lynch is incredibly unique. Not at all like slaw dressing. It’s a tomato-based dressing that has a taste all its own. If you can’t find it where you are, you can always order online. I have links available in all of the recipes that I do for them. 🙂