These Crock Pot Beefy Hearty Beans are a great way beef up a weeknight dinner. They can be prepped the night before and cook all day!
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Aunt Lou here.
I love this recipe because you can cut up your onion, fry up your beef and bacon and put your beans on to soak the night before. The next morning, you can throw all the ingredients together you prepared the night before in a no time! This is also a great all-day recipe. Tons of wins with these yummy Crock Pot Beefy Hearty Beans folks! This recipe was inspired from a recipe in Crock Pot’s 365 Days of Crock Pot Recipes.
Crock Pot Beefy Hearty Beans
Note: Scroll to the bottom for the printable recipe.
Ingredients for Crock Pot Beefy Hearty Beans
- 1 lb pinto beans, cleaned, soaked overnight and drained
- 1 lb ground beef
- 1 small onion, diced
- 3/4 lb bacon, fried and crumbled, reserving 2 tablespoons of drippings
- 8 cups water
- 2 10 oz cans diced tomatoes with green chiles
- 6 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 teaspoon chili powder
- 1/4 teaspoon cumin
How to Make Beefy Hearty Beans in a Crock Pot
- In a skillet, brown your ground beef with your onion and drain
- Place your beans, beef and bacon crumbles in your crock pot
- Cover with 8 cups of water
- Add remaining ingredients and stir gently
- Cover and cook on low for 8-10 hours
Crock Pot Beefy Hearty Beans Notes:
- You can serve these Crock Pot Beef Hearty Beans up with a slotted spoon for a delicious side or with a ladle for a yummy soup!
- I used my 6-quart Programmable Travel Crock Pot. It was the perfect size for this recipe.
- As with any of our recipes, calorie counts and nutritional information varies greatly depending on which products you choose to use when cooking this dish.
- All slow cookers cook differently, so cooking times are always a basic guideline and should always be tested first in your own slow cooker and time adjusted as needed.
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Crock Pot Beefy Hearty Beans
Ingredients
- 1 lb pinto beans cleaned, soaked overnight and drained
- 1 lb ground beef
- 1 small onion diced
- 3/4 lb bacon fried and crumbled, reserving 2 tablespoons of drippings
- 8 cups water
- 20 oz diced tomatoes with green chiles (2-10 oz cans)
- 6 cloves garlic minced
- 1 teaspoon chili powder
- 1/4 teaspoon cumin
Instructions
- In a skillet, brown your ground beef with your onion and drain
- Place your beans, beef and bacon crumbles in your crock pot
- Cover with 8 cups of water
- Add remaining ingredients and stir gently
- Cover and cook on low for 8-10 hours
Notes
- You can serve these Crock Pot Beef Hearty Beans up with a slotted spoon for a delicious side or with a ladle for a yummy soup!
- I used my 6-quart Programmable Travel Crock Pot. It was the perfect size for this recipe.
- As with any of our recipes, calorie counts and nutritional information varies greatly depending on which products you choose to use when cooking this dish.
- All slow cookers cook differently, so cooking times are always a basic guideline and should always be tested first in your own slow cooker and time adjusted as needed.
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Can this be frozen?
We haven’t tried freezing these. If you give it a try, let us know how it goes!
I hv just put on the pot but without cummin and chili powder. Is it going to be ok?? I also added soulfood season. Yes im southern lol.
I haven’t tried this recipe with those changes. It will change the flavor since the seasonings are different, but might be quite tasty! Let me know how it turns out!
Hello! Could I use this recipe with a 4qt. slow cooker using pinto beans and later on blackeye peas recipe? It is just me and I have a 4qt and I think a 7qt. Thanks for everything. Many blessing to you and yours.
I’m not sure this would fit well in a 4 quart slow cooker. If you want to make fewer portions, you can hover over the blue servings number in the recipe card and move the slider that appears to how many portions you desire. That will change the amounts on the ingredients to match what you would need. (Cris explains it really well here: https://www.recipesthatcrock.com/resourcestips-tools/how-to-adjust-crock-pot-servings/). If you still want all the servings, I think this would be better for your 7 quart slow cooker. Enjoy!
I’ve made these beans a few times now and my husband said they’re the best he’s ever had. I love the flavors. The adjustment I make is that I double the chili powder. Thanks for sharing.
Question… If I double the recipe would I double the water?
Hi Lisa!
I haven’t ever tried doubling this recipe. I’m not sure it would all fit in a 6-quart. I would recommend making two batches.
Aunt Lou
What is the reserved bacon drippings for?
Hi Rachel!
The bacon drippings add flavor to the beans and are added in step 4. Enjoy!
Aunt Lou
Can you substitute anything else for the bacon if you don’t have it.
Hi Heather!
If you don’t have bacon, you could use Bacon Bits or Real Bacon Pieces. If you don’t have either of those, you can omit them. It will change the flavor of the recipe some, but the beans should still have a good flavor with all the other ingredients. Enjoy!
Aunt Lou
I have to be honest here,this looked sooo goood in the pic that i just knew it would taste great so i made double the amount,following the exact recipe x2. I made a huge mistake, i spent $31 to make the blandest pot of beans i have ever tasted,its kind of like chili,but then again its not. Maybe like if you took a 15oz can of chili and then added 2 gallons of water to it,thats what it tastes like. I just added 2 packs of chili’o to it and another can of diced tomatoes in hopes of saving my investment…sorry…just being honest…
Hi Danny!
Sorry this was not your cup of tea! We recommend always trying a new recipe first before doubling. Hope you were able to enjoy it in the end!
~Aunt Lou
Am I able to use canned pinto beans? If so, do I adjust the water ratio and/or time?”
Hi Christina!
I haven’t tried this with canned pinto beans. I think it would work. I would use the canned pinto beans undrained and reduce the water quite a bit since the beans won’t be soaking up the water while they cook. Also, watch it closely the first time you make it to know how to adjust the timing for the canned beans. I would start checking it around the 3-4 hour mark depending on how hot your slow cooker cooks. If you give it a try, let me know what adjustments you made and how it turns out!
~Aunt Lou
Hi Kathi
How can I prepare this recipe in my instapot?
Hi Tonya!
I haven’t made this in an electric pressure cooker yet, but I think I will add it to my list! I’ll post the link here when I figure out the timing and have the recipe up on our site! Thanks for the idea!
~Aunt Lou
You talk about preparing the onions the night before but I don’t see them in your recipe. Are they in your recipe?
Hi Anne!
You’ll add them in on step 3 when you add in the remaining ingredients. Enjoy!
Aunt Lou
I have a similar way to prepare pinto beans in a slow cooker. Since I love pinto beans and didn’t just want a different way to prepare chili I would not put in the chili powder or the cumin. Nor would I add the tomatoes. But this recipe gave me the idea to add a couple of small cans of diced chilies. I don’t know why I never tried that before. But I am going to add the bacon to my “plainer” pot of beans. It just sounds good.
Hi Pam!
That sounds great! I love it when readers take our recipes and make them their own! I do want to clarify that this doesn’t taste like chili. Even with the chili powder and cumin, all of the flavors meld together perfectly into a unique flavor. Enjoy!
Aunt Lou
Well I soaked the beans for 11 hours then I browned the meat and onions, cooked the bacon and saved 2tbsp of bacon grease. Then I put all ingredients in my crockpot and cooked it on low for 9 hours. Beans still weren’t done so I cooked them on high for 4 more hours, still the beans weren’t soft. I am now going to cook them 4 more hours and I will let you know. Can’t figure out what when wrong.
Hi Mary!
I’m so sorry to hear this. It sounds like your crock pot is not getting hot enough. If you have a different slow cooker, I would try it next time.
Aunt Lou
Would love to try this recipe for a pot luck that is coming up in a few weeks. Question – can you add a slurry of 1/4 water and 1 Tablespoon corn starch to thicken the sauce (broth) so it’s not soupy? Your thought and comments on this please?
Hi Kathi!
I haven’t tried that with this recipe, but if I wanted to thicken it up, that is what I would try. Enjoy!
Aunt Lou
The longer you let the beans cook/simmer the thicker the broth will become.