The Bean-Hole-Bean Kettle

Northern New England antique witch kettle discourse may not step over the bean-hole-bean. This kettle usage is, in fact, the most likely format that one will encounter the old witch kettle being actually used. The most likely spot for this sighting is at a northern New England fair during the late summer. One may also goggle the bean-hole-bean with splendid results.
The short history of a beans-baked-buried begins with the Maine Native Americans, jumps to the winter logging camp, is then captured by the boy scouts' cooking merit badge and now finally rest as a standard country fair side show. It should be understood that should one engage the bean-hole-bean buried cooking process… EVEN ONCE… one is in the club for life. Most members are "once did that". Having a spoonful on a paper plate at a country fair does NOT qualify.
Although the Maine Native American may claim the source, it is the logging camp that …buried, literally, the process. The prefix word is "DAILY". Daily bean-hole-beans were made… DAILY… in the logging camps. Burying the kettle took place EVERY DAY.
In the …crude, squat, long… log cabin bunk house with an attached shed or two, a cook's kitchen at one end, a row of bunk beds and their… length of building… benches before them along each side, no windows, one door and only poor chinking between the logs to admit fresh air… with ALL the men inside each evening… way, way out in the northern Maine woods… buried in the snow… from late fall to early spring… is the perfected bean-hole-bean cooking and the kettle. This wholeness has now vanished and is legacy only.
In the center of the cabin was a large wooden log framed box… filled with sand or sandy soil. On the top of this sandbox the heating of the cabin took place with a large fire. The smoke went out a large hole in the roof. This fire was going continually but with a perpetually managed, usually by the cooking staff, "burned low" to …near bonfire changes throughout the day and night. Bean-hole-beans is the cooking of baked beans in a buried cast iron kettle. EVERY evening after the evening meal when the fire was low, the cook would… ALL WITHOUT CEREMONY… push the fire aside, dig a hole in the sand QUICKLY, set the usually two gallon kettle with the beans in the hole, cover them with coals and embers from the fire… leaving the kettle handle sticking up so the kettle may be easily fetched out… and topping off with the sand. The fire would then be built up to a roaring blaze for the warmth and entertainment of the men.
The beans in their kettle sat buried. Before the fire the men whittled, smoked, joked, spit, yarned, sewed, dried socks, sang and played cards… or cribbage… until the fire ebbed low and it was bedtime. All the next day including the giant blaze that came at dawn, the beans in the kettle stayed buried. Finally, later in the afternoon when the fire was low and the men "will be coming", the cook returned to the firebox, exposed the kettle and the handle, carefully lifted the kettle out, took it to his kitchen. The fire was rebuilt for the men and the cook… pulled off the lid and… stirred up the hot ready to be served beans. All of the cooked beans would be eaten every day.
The photographs show a true 19th century logging camp used bean-hole-bean kettle. The preferred standard form is the classic witch kettle. The tin lids were always handmade to fit each kettle. They must fit snug and truly cap the kettle. Today one sees loose lids in use but for the logging camp daily ritual a cook risked little and wanted a tight, deep lid. One may also see all sorts of cast iron cookware "buried" to "cook" something, generally beans. The classic IS the three legged witch kettle. This raised the hot kettle preventing it from burning a surface and eased serving. This was usually done by the youngest of the cook's help whose job was to "spoon out" the beans onto each man's plate as he presented it. The kettle was placed on an overturned wooden box at the end of the chow line "Coming out right" (nothing left or not "short") was the first skill this young man learned as a cook.
It should be clear as to how the bean-hole-bean is now a "once was" with the beauty of the perfected beans being found in the daily repetitions of the process. Today a spoonful at a country fair sideshow is about the closest one may get. The kettles; an actual true 19th century bean holer, with it's original lid, are hard to find and costly. One may easily purchase a new bean hole kettle… with a manufactured lid… but that too is costly. As a decorative object, in the northern New England home, a true old bean-hole-bean kettle has a special cache for one may respond (only when asked) that "it was my grandfather's. He used it when they logged in the winters". "Up north".