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Crockpot Calico Beans are a fabulous way to cook up the classic ground beef and beans dish! Now you can cook up calico beans all day, low and slow and have a delicious dinner when you get home from work!
Love your slow cooker? Try our Honey Garlic Slow Cooker Chicken Thighs or our Crockpot Ham and Potato Soup.
Slow Cooker Calico Beans are Easy to Make & Delicious!
Calico beans are the kind of dish that your slow cooker is made for! You can also cook them up fast in my Instant Pot Calico Beans if you cant or don’t want to leave them in a crockpot all day to simmer. That recipe cooks up in a mere 15 minutes, excluding prep! Crockpot calico beans are meant for when you are gone all day and need a hot dinner to come home to.
Which slow cooker should I use for this Crockpot Calico Beans recipe?
For this recipe, we recommend a 6-8 quart oval shaped crockpot (slow cooker) such as the ones listed below.
Tips and Tricks for Making the BEST Crockpot Calico beans
- Make sure you pick a molasses and beans that you love! I don’t like beans that have a BBQ based sauce in them, I find that it’s not the taste profile that I am looking for in the beans. Make sure you use your favourite beans, and sweeter ones are better in this recipe.
- Taste test and sweeten the beans to your liking with the ketchup and maybe even a pinch of brown sugar. This is actually a quite sweet tasting recipe, which is part of it’s charm. There’s just nothing like calico beans!
- It’s ok to leave the Lima beans out. A lot of people don’t like them and you can replace them with kidney beans or another bean that you enjoy instead.
Happy Cooking!
The Fast & Slow Team.
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Slow Cooker Calico Beans
- Prep Time
- 10 minutes
- Cook Time
- 8 hours
- Total Time
- 8 hours 10 minutes
- Course
- Main Course
- Cuisine
- American
- Servings
- 8
- Calories
- 268
- Equipment
- Slow Cooker
- Author
- Fast & Slow Cooking
Ingredients
- 4 slices thick cut bacon diced
- 1 pound lean ground beef
- 1/2 cup chopped onion
- 1 can 28 ounces molasses pork and beans
- 1 can 16 ounces kidney beans rinsed and drained
- 1 can 16 ounces lima beans rinsed and drained
- 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
- 1/2 cup ketchup
- 1 tablespoon cider vinegar
- 1 teaspoon prepared mustard
- 1 teaspoon salt
Instructions
- In a large skillet cook the bacon for 2-3 minutes. Add in the beef and onion and cook until the meat is no longer pink, then drain.
- Combine the beef mixture, bacon, beans, brown sugar, ketchup, vinegar, mustard and salt in a slow cooker.
- For the slow cooker, you can cook on high for 3-4 hours, or low for 6-8 hours. If you are cooking on high be prepared for stirring it once in a while in case your crockpot runs hot. The beans can burn on the edges if you have a really hot slow cooker.
- Serve and enjoy!
Nutrition Information
All calories and info are based on a third party calculator and are only an estimate. Actual nutritional info will vary with brands used, your measuring methods, portion sizes and more.
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