Easy Vegan Baked Beans

These vegan baked beans are a simple and easy to make classic. Serve them as a side at a barbecue or over your favorite toast for breakfast. They’re a flavorful and gluten free recipe that only takes about 10 minutes of prep!

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The key to really easy vegan baked beans? Use canned beans! Once it’s all said and done, it tastes just the same as using dried beans and saves you so much time.

Navy beans are usually used in baked beans, but I used cannellini because that’s what my grocery store had. Any small white bean will work well!

Baked beans are usually made with bacon, so they aren’t vegan friendly. However, they are very easy to veganize! Just leave off the bacon and make a few sauce substitutions and you have a recipe that tastes just as good as the classic.

How to make this recipe

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

Finely chop the onion and mince the garlic and add to a large pan or dutch oven with the oil. It’ll save a step to use a cast iron pan so it can go right in the oven!

Saute until the onion starts to look translucent. Add all remaining ingredients and stir to combine.

If using a cast iron pan or dutch oven you can keep it right in there, otherwise transfer to an oven safe baking dish.

Cover with foil and bake for 45 minutes.

Remove the foil, stir, and serve warm. If you want it more saucy, add a splash of veggie broth and stir.

Serving suggestions

Baked beans are traditionally served over toast for breakfast, but they’re also great as a side dish at a barbecue served with macaroni salad, burgers, and grilled corn.

Do they keep well?

Yes! Once prepared, this recipe will store well in the fridge for about 5 days. It makes a fairly large batch so it’s perfect for big gatherings or if you just like having leftovers on hand.

Do you need ketchup?

Ketchup is often used in baked beans to add flavor and sweetness, but to keep the sugar a bit lower than usual, I opted for tomato sauce. As written the recipe is still quite sweet, but not too sweet, so feel free to add more or less maple syrup or brown sugar to your liking. 

Final tips

• I like baked beans on the thicker side, if you prefer them more saucy, you can use 1 cup of tomato sauce instead of 2/3 cup or add vegetable broth before baking until it looks nice and saucy.

• I only used 3 tbsp of molasses in this recipe because I prefer the taste that way, but for a more traditional flavor, go with 4, or even more if that’s your thing! The flavors in this recipe are very easy to tailor to your own preferences, so don’t be afraid to taste and adjust as you like!

• Traditional baked beans uses par boiled, then baked, beans, which results in a soft but still slightly firm texture. Because we’re using canned beans in this recipe, the final texture will be pretty soft, but I personally prefer it this way. It’s great with the nice crunch of toast!

You’ll also love…

• Three Bean Chili
• Red Beans and Rice
• Instant Pot Black Beans

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