Did she ruin the beans?

[jjdbike]

I love beans and make them on a regular. My wife half watches me cook them from a distance & thinks she knows how I do it. She doesn’t. She tells me my mom did them so much quicker and simpler and they were delicious. What she doesn’t take into account, this was over 50 yrs ago, & I’ll bet she only 1/2 watched her mom at a distance too.
She soaked navy beans overnight. Brought water up to just hot, but not quite a boil and turned them off. Then she mixed w/ brown sugar, worstashire sauce & ketchup and baked for an hour at 275. Surprise, not even close to done & dry. She baked another 2 hours. Same thing, hard and dryer.

She’s determined to do these herself her (moms) way. Now she wants to freeze them because we’re hitting the road for a week and says she’ll finish cooking them when we return. I’m afraid they’re ruined and think they should just be tossed and started from scratch correctly.

Did she ruin them? Can they be frozen as is and finished latter?

Thanks,

JD

[LA Pork Butt]

It sounds like most of all she did it her way. I would let her keep trying to do it her way and hope she will search for a different way - if not your way at least one that works. Experience is a hard teacher. She gives the test first and the lesson afterwards. Hopefully your wife learns the lesson.

[Purc]

Freeze them. They say.... Happy Wife, Happy Life.

[hoovarmin]

Bro they are just beans, so laugh it off and order Uber Eats. Let her be happily wrong and you score.

[mrichie1229]

Truer words have never been spoken.

[ofelles]

+2

[MsTwiggy]

hoovarmin really knows what he's talking' about here!!!

[captainlee]

A battle that can't be won. Just let her do her thing and let it play out.

[WayneT]

A slippery slope if ever there was one. What hoovarmin said.

[RonB]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qQzdAsjWGPg

[hoovarmin]

If he plays that for her when she serves the beans, well, it was nice knowing you

[wu7y]

Don't ferget, ol' Blue Eyes was married four times. Don't know when he began singing "My Way" but if he sang it around the house it may have had something to do with that.

[CaptainMike]

Not a hill to die on.

[ItsAllGoneToTheDogs]

a hill of beans to die on you say?

[Old Glory]

I will just throw out there that the beans could be old. I have had beans go hard and dry on me for no reason. No amount of cooking could soften them up.

[FireMan]

Live and learn.

ps. Can’t die from beans.

[smokin fool]

If cooking was my wife’s domain only our marriage wouldn’t have made it outta the first week.
Lucky for me my wife knows she’s a lousy cook and leaves the majority of it up to me.
Don’t get me wrong toast, corn flakes, chicken nuggets, outta the park.... the rest....work in progress.
Never tried to make my on beans, give it a try this fall.

[IowaGirl]

Never add acids to uncooked beans (molasses in the brown sugar and the ketchup), because the acid prevents the beans from softening. Not to mention the temp and time were not right either.

That said, if your spouse wants to freeze them to see if she can finish them after your vacation, don't get into an argument about it. I sincerely doubt it will work, but sometimes people need to learn the hard way. Don't get in the middle of this lesson -- you'll only come out the loser. And a wise spouse won't do an "I told you so" afterwards either.

[FireMan]

Yup, live & learn.

[Allon]

Years ago I showed my wife how I make chili taste like chili without the heat. She loved it as she has to be extremely aware of any spices in her food.

Her side of the family (especially her mother) loves the taste without the heat. Now she refers to the chili as 'My chili'.

So, what did I do? There's only one answer.

Now, I call it her chili too!

[Murdy]

If you disrupt her experiment, she will claim that the beans would have come out fine if you had only let her finish. So, don't disrupt her experiment.

[Draznnl]

Do you honestly see a path to victory here? If so, would you share it with the rest of us? Remember, they are only beans. It isn’t like she is trying to smoke a brisket her way. That might be a hill to die on. But beans? Let her do her thing.