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Cider-Cured Ham River Cottage

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135 views1 page

Cider-Cured Ham River Cottage

Uploaded by

creaselad88
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Home / Recipes / Cider-cured ham

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Cider-cured ham

There are few better partnerships than pork


and apple. There are even fewer better than
pork and cider, a bit of old English alchemy. This
recipe can be applied to a whole leg of pork,
weighing 10kg or more, but you can use a
smaller portion off the bone or even a chump.
The quantities here are for a small, whole
boned-out leg or half a large leg. Ideal for
Boxing Day, this needs at least 15 days curing
time.

Servs
8

Method

Put all the ingredients for the brine into a large saucepan,
bring to the boil and leave to cool. Transfer to a food-
standard brine tub and chill to 3–4°C.

Weigh your piece of pork, then place it in the tub and


submerge it completely in the brine, using a food-standard
tray with a weight on top. Leave the pork in the brine, in the
coolest place you can find if the tub is too large for your
fridge, for a minimum of 3 days (or maximum of 4 days) for
every kg. The minimum time will suffice if you plan to cook
and eat the ham soon after it has finished curing, but you
should use the maximum time if you intend to keep it much
longer.

After its allotted time, remove the ham from the cure, wipe it
dry with a cotton cloth and hang it to dry in a well-ventilated
cool place for 24 hours.

You can then cold-smoke it if you like: hang it high above a


hardwood fire or put it in your cold smoker and either smoke
it continuously for 24 hours or intermittently (6–12 hours a
day) for 2–4 days. The ideal air temperature where the ham
is smoking is 27°C; a little variation won’t hurt, but it should
not exceed 40°C.

Smoked or unsmoked, this ham keeps well if you go for the


maximum cure time: hang it in a well-ventilated outbuilding,
or covered porch where a draught can get to it but the rain
can’t, and it should keep right through the winter months. In
warmer weather, hams are at risk from flies and other bugs,
so it’s best to get them cooked before too long. A minimum-
cure-time unsmoked ham should be kept in the fridge,
wrapped in a cloth or muslin, but not plastic, and cooked
within a month of curing.

Cooking your ham

Many recipes suggest hams should be soaked in plenty of


fresh water, which is changed every 12 hours, for 24–48
hours depending on the length of the cure, before boiling. We
don’t subscribe to this – it smacks of not getting the original
cure right. If you draw the moisture out and drive the salty
cure in, then undo part of this by soaking it in water, the ham
won’t know whether it’s coming or going.

Instead, put your ham in a large cooking pot, cover with


water, bring to the boil and simmer very gently for 2–5 hours,
depending on size. If the water tastes very salty after the first
hour of cooking, pour at least half of it away and top up with
fresh boiling water from the kettle. When the fat starts to
separate from the meat, it should be ready.

You can either serve the ham plain-boiled or add a further


stage of baking, which works well for a festive centrepiece on
Boxing Day: remove the ham from the cooking liquor and
allow it to cool slightly. Preheat the oven to 180°C/Gas mark
4. Slice the skin off the ham and score the fat in a diamond
pattern. Mix 100g honey with 2 tbsp English mustard to make
a honey mustard glaze and smear it over the ham. Place in
the oven for about 40 minutes–1 hour, depending on size,
until caramelised. Serve hot or at roomtemperature.
Sumptuous.

Note: There is an alternative method for brining, using a brine


pump. Instead of submerging the product in the brine you use
a pump to inject the brine into the product. This method is a
bit too hit or miss though as it doesn’t give a uniform result.
And it doesn’t work at all on anything smaller than a large
chicken.

Ingredients

• A whole or ½ leg of free-range pork, boned and


chilled

For the brine

• 1.1kg PDV salt


• 1 litre pressed apple juice (i.e. not from
concentrate)
• 1 litre strong dry cider
• 2.5 litres water
• 1kg demerara sugar
• 1kg dark brown sugar or black treacle
• 20–30 juniper berries
• 30g black peppercorns, crushed
• 10 bay leaves, crushed
• 10 cloves

Equipment

• Food-standard brine tub


• Food-standard tray
• Cold smoker (optional)

This recipe is taken from...

River Cottage Curing &


Smoking Handbook

If you like this recipe, you might like


the following course...

Christmas Curing and Smoking

The magic of Christmas meets the alchemy of


curing and smoking on our wonderfully festive
one-day course.

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