Step up your boring side dishes with these outstanding roasted green beans with bacon with an exceptional sauce. Ultra easy from fresh or frozen beans, this will be a family staple.
Introduction
I'm always looking for great veggie side dishes. Readers of this blog know I have veggies issues. We are more of a meatassorous household. So a recipe topped with bacon has obvious appeal.
My wife came up with this inspiration piece, Smothered Green Beans at Plain Chicken. Now, I'm sure Stephanie at Plain Chicken would not even recognize it as coming from her inspiration.
I did keep the bacon. I went with frozen, but fresh will work, not canned beans. I changed ratios, more butter, less soy. And I greatly changed the size. But the flavor idea is the same.
My Rating
My wife (the queen of all meatassorouses) gave it a 5 with the frozen beans. Her cousin had three servings. I think it is a high 4 to low five.
The Green Beans
We use frozen whole beans all the time and fresh beans when they look good. The original recipe was for canned green beans. We gave up on canned beans years ago due to texture issues.
The frozen beans are generally blanched some but not otherwise cooked. They will keep a good color, and the texture here is just fine. Use only whole green beans and not French or cut beans. Neither will give good results.
Fresh beans will work fine, but color may not be as nice since we do not take the time to blanch. While reasonable fresh vegetables are available year-round, the peak season is June through September, and local fresh will be best.
If using fresh beans, then look for the vibrant green color, smooth skin without seed swells. They should be firm with no wrinkles and also firm.
📖Vegetable Recipes
Green Beans with Toasted Almonds
Roasted Garlic Parmesan Asparagus
Green Bean Casserole Without Soup
🖼️Step-by-Step Photo Instructions
Preheat oven to 375° convection or 400° conventional.
Cut 3-4 pieces of bacon into pieces and fry. Stop just before crispy and drain on a paper towel.
Melt 2 tablespoons salted butter in a microwave. Add 2 tablespoons brown sugar, 1 tablespoon soy sauce, and ½ teaspoon garlic powder.
Add one pound green beans to an 8 by 8 baking dish. Spread the bacon over the beans. Drizzle the liquid over the dish.
Bake, until beans are tender and thinner beans are browning. About 20-25 minutes for fresh beans or 35-40 minutes for frozen whole beans.
📖Full Recipe
Green Beans with Bacon
Ingredients
- 1 pound whole green beans - frozen or fresh
- 3-4 strips bacon
- 2 tablespoons butter
- 2 tablespoons brown sugar
- 1 tablespoon soy sauce - low sodium preferred
- ½ teaspoon garlic powder
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 375° convection or 400° conventional.
- Cut 3-4 pieces of bacon into pieces and fry. Stop just before crispy and drain on a paper towel.
- Melt 2 tablespoons salted butter in a microwave. Add 2 tablespoons brown sugar, 1 tablespoon soy sauce, and ½ teaspoon garlic powder.
- Add one pound green beans to an 8 by 8 baking dish. Spread the bacon over the beans. Drizzle the liquid over the dish.
- Bake, until beans are tender and thinner beans are browning. About 20-25 minutes for fresh beans or 35-40 minutes for frozen whole beans.
Recipe Notes
Pro Tips
- Doubles easily in a 9 by 13 dish. Cooking time will be about the same.
- This works fine with frozen whole green beans. Do not use cut or French green beans.
- Fresh green beans also work well for this but pick firm beans with good color, smooth skin, and no seed swells. Also, mostly the same size works best.
- Easy to prep ahead for a dinner. Cook the bacon, make the sauce and then assemble and bake.
- We use this for company meals and usually make it with frozen whole beans. It is reliably done for use at 40 minutes in the oven. Great for planning.
To adjust the recipe size:
You may adjust the number of servings in this recipe card under servings. This does the math for the ingredients for you. BUT it does NOT adjust the text of the instructions. So you need to do that yourself.
Nutrition Estimate
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Editor's Note: Originally Published February 22, 2017. Updated with expanded options, refreshed photos, and a table of contents to help navigation.
Connie
I made this recipe last night with fresh from our garden new young beans. After 30+ minutes the beans were still not done. The sauce and bacon were good but not the beans. We don't like mushy beans but also don't like under dine ones.
I use many of your recipes and love them
Disappointed in this one....will go back to cooking beans on stove top.
Stephanie
I just recently stumbled across your blog and am so happy I did. My husband is the cook in our home. On my "cooking nights" we went out to eat. ;) But during this pandemic, I have been trying to be fair to my husband and take on some of the cooking. So far I've tried the Tuna Noodle Casserole and the Apple Crisp. I know there are a ton of recipes to try, but I'm trying to start small with things I can do. I am admittedly, a terrible cook. I made these green beans last week and my husband loved them. I plan on making them again very soon. Thank you for sharing. I much prefer baking as I am very analytical and precise. I am a decent baker and will be checking out all of your yummy baking recipes at some point. Thank you again!
Terri
Really, really good.
Dan Mikesell AKA DrDan
Hi Terri,
Welcome to the blog.
Glad you enjoyed the recipe and thanks for the rating.
Dan
KIm F.
Super good... what a great flavor combo! I did end up baking for about 50 minutes... I tend to over cook our vegetables, we like them on the soft side. Thank you for sharing another great recipe!
DrDan
Hi Kim,
Welcome to the blog.
This is one of our favorites. I think it is the bacon for my wife.
Thanks for the note.
Dan
S
This was delicious. I made it for a family gathering and almost all of it was eaten! I doubled the green beans/bacon and over-doubled the sauce recipe, with a little more soy sauce, as I felt the original sugar to salt ratio was somewhat overpowering. I used my toaster oven to bake it, at regular 375 (vs. convection) for about 50 minutes. I would make this again. :) Thanks for sharing!
DrDan
Hi S,
Welcome to the blog.
This has become our go to veggie recipe for company steak meals. So I have done it probably 30 plus times.
What I find surprising is that frozen whole green beans work better than fresh... Unexpected.
Thanks for the note.
Dan
Pat
Looks delicious!