Ever wondered which brand of baked beans taste best?
I sometimes lie awake at night thinking about this kind of stuff.
So, I invited four biker friends to join me in a blind bean tasting.
I bought 11 brands of beans but reduced the number to 9. Why? One of the brands; SaveMor, was fairly unknown and I thought it was unlikely that any of us would come across it on our bike trips.
The other brand that got eliminated was Pick ‘n Pay Choice Grade. I had the Pick n Pay Standard Grade as well, so I chose the Standard over the Choice. I shouldnt have done that...
Here are the brands we tested:
- Spar
- Koo
- Food Lovers
- Heinz
- Dürsors
- Checkers House Brand
- Farmgi rl
- Pick n Pay Standard Grade
- Rhodes
The testers were - and I use aliases - Kaboef, Butch, Sparky, Lommies and me (not pictured). Whiskey was served as a pallet cleaner between tastings. As one does.
Method:
I asked my wife to open all the tins in the kitchen while we five bikers sat outside in the garden drinking whiskey. Again, as one does.
She numbered plastic cups with a marker and filled each cup with a few spoonfuls of beans. She then drew up a sheet with the brand names alongside the corresponding numbers. We tasters were each given our own numbered cup and were unaware which brand was in which cup.
We scored the beans and the wife of one of the testers, who is also an accountant, tallied our votes. Unfortunately our accountant also had access to the whiskey and after several failed attempts at basic arithmetic we finally determined a winner. On with the test:
Cold test - the beans:
Impression of the
beans themselves.
Jurors were asked to rate on
bean flavor,
texture and whether they were
under or overcooked.
| Brand | Me | Butch | Kaboef | Sparky | Lommies | Total |
| Food Lovers | 2 | 2 | 3 | 3 | 5 | 17 |
| Farmgirl | 2 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 8 |
| Checkers | 3 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 10 |
| Koo | 4 | 4 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 18 |
| Rhodes | 3 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 12 |
| Spar | 4 | 4 | 4 | 2 | 3 | 16 |
| Pick n Pay | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 5 |
| Dürsors | 3 | 4 | 4 | 2 | 1 | 14 |
| Heinz | 3 | 1 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 14 |
The clear winner here is
Koo with
18 points.
The loser is Pick n Pay with 5 points
Cold test - the sauce:
Impression of the unheated
sauce, disregarding the beans.
Jurors were asked to rate on
tomato flavour,
colour and whether it was
watery or thick.
| Brand | Me | Butch | Kaboef | Sparky | Lommies | Total |
| Food Lovers | 3 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 14 |
| Farmgirl | 1 | 1 | 3 | 0 | 2 | 7 |
| Checkers | 2 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 9 |
| Koo | 5 | 4 | 4 | 3 | 5 | 21 |
| Rhodes | 3 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 7 |
| Spar | 4 | 4 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 16 |
| Pick n Pay | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 5 |
| Dürsors | 1 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 2 | 15 |
| Heinz | 4 | 3 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 19 |
The winning sauce is made by
Koo with a respectable
21 points total.
The loser is Pick n Pay with 5 points.
Cold test - overall impression:
Impression of the
complete product.
Jurors were asked to rate on the
general taste, and whether it looked
appetizing.
| Brand | Me | Butch | Kaboef | Sparky | Lommies | Total |
| Food Lovers | 4 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 16 |
| Farmgirl | 2 | 1 | 2.5 | 1 | < td>28.5 |
| Checkers | 3 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 10 |
| Koo | 5 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 21 |
| Rhodes | 3 | 1 | 1.5 | 1 | 2 | 8.5 |
| Spar | 4 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 4 | 18 |
| Pick n Pay | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 5 |
| Dürsors | 2 | 3 | 4 | 3 | 1 | 13 |
| Heinz | 4 | 2 | 3.25 | 4 | 4 | 17.25 |
The clear winner here is
Koo with
21 points.
The loser, as always, is Pick n Pay with 5 points.
Warm test - the beans:
Impression of the
beans served warmed up.
Jurors were again asked to rate on
flavor,
texture and whether they were
under or overcooked.
| Brand | Me | Butch | Kaboef | Sparky | Lommies | Total |
| Food Lovers | 4 | 3 | 4 | 3 | 5 | 19 |
| Farmgirl | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 8 |
| Checkers | 2 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 3 | 9 |
| Koo | 3 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 4 | 16 |
| Rh odes | 3 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 12 |
| Spar | 4 | 4 | 4 | 2 | 4 | 18 |
| Pick n Pay | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 5 |
| Dürsors | 2 | 5 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 15 |
| Heinz | 2 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 4 | 15 |
The new winner here is
Food Lovers with
19 points.
Still the loser: Pick n Pay with 5 points.
Warm test - the sauce:
Impression of the warm
sauce, disregarding the beans.
Jurors were asked to rate on tomato
flavour,
colour and whether it was
watery or thick.
| Brand | Me | Butch | Kaboef | Sparky | Lommies | Total |
| Food Lovers | 5 | 5 | 4 | 4 | 5 | 23 |
| Farmgirl | 2 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 7 |
| Checkers | 2 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 3 | 9 |
| Koo | 4 | 5 | 4 | 2 | 3 | 18 |
| Rhodes | 2 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 8 |
| Spar | 5 | 5 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 16 |
| Pick n Pay | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 6 |
| Dürsors | 3 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 5 | 18 |
| Heinz | 1 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 4 | 15 |
The winning sauc e is made by
Food Lovers with a very respectable
23 points total
The loser is once more Pick n Pay with 6 points (one point up from the cold serving)
Warm test - overall impression:
Impression of the
complete product.
Jurors were asked to rate on the
general taste, and whether it looked
appetizing.| Brand | Me | Butch | Kaboef | Sparky | Lommies | Total |
| Food Lovers | 5 | 4 | 4 | 5 | 5 | 23 |
| Farmgirl | 2 | 1 | 1.5 | 1 | 2 | 7.5 |
| Checkers | 2 | 2 | 1.5 | 0 | 3 | 8.5 |
| Koo | 4< /td> | 4 | 3.5 | 3 | 4 | 18.5 |
| Rhodes | 3 | 3 | 2.5 | 1 | 2 | 11.5 |
| Spar | 4 | 5 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 20 |
| Pick n Pay | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 6 |
| Dürsors | 2 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 4 | 15 |
| Heinz | 1 | 4 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 16 |
And the winner here is
Food Lovers with
23 points.
The loser, no surprise, is Pick n Pay with 6 points.
And the winner is…
I hereby declare
Koo to be the best purveyor of baked beans!
Koo wins by a hair’s breadth over Food Lovers. But when you consider that Food Lovers is only available at Fruit and Veg City and Koo can be found almost anywhere, this is excellent news!
| Brand | Total |
| Food Lovers | 112.0 |
| Farmgirl | 46 |
| Checkers | 54.5 |
| Koo | 112.5 |
| Rhodes | 59 |
| Spar | 107 |
| Pick n Pay | 32 |
| Dürsors | 90 |
| Heinz | 96.3 |
Things we learnt:- Pick n Pay’s Standard Grade is diabolical! The jurors weren’t always in agreement on which one was the best, but they never failed to identify the worst of them. I tried the Choice Grade since the tasting but it’s still not particularly good and would probably still have come last.
- Mediocre beans cannot be improved much by heating them, but some of the sauces do get better when they are warmed.
- Of all 9 brands we tried none tasted exactly the same as another. One cannot claim that a bean is a bean is a bean…
Some comments (given before the brands were known to us, but inserted now after the scores were tallied) were:
LuckyStriker on Heinz: “The beans are a little over-cooked, nice salty and thick sauce though.
Butch on Spar: “I detect molasses with a caramel aftertasteâ€
Kaboef on Pick n Pay: “The beans fall apart.†Kaboef was the only juror who insisted on scoring in decimal points. I suspect it had something to do with the whiskey.
Sparky on Rhodes: “Beans are all split; tastes like someone ate them before meâ€
Lommies on Farmgirl: “Bland†Apparently he feels differently about actual farm girls though.
End?
