Home › The Principles of Cookery › HAM, BRAISED (a la Francaise)
HAM, BRAISED (a la Francaise)
Trim, soak, and prepare the ham in the same way as for boiling. Wrap it in a cloth, and put it in a braising-pan with plenty of cold water, three or four green onions, a sprig of parsley and thyme, and four cloves. Calculate the length of time which will be required to cook it (see HAM, BOILED), and, when it is done enough, drain it, and put it into the pan again, with a bottle of Madeira or sherry. Simmer gently for half an hour. Let it cool in the saucepan, and glaze the ham. Time, from three to five hours, according to its size. Probable cost, 1s. per pound.
A Victorian method for a whole cured ham: poach it in aromatic water, then finish it in fortified wine. Most of the translation work is in the ham itself, since modern hams are far less salty than the ones Cassell's readers bought.
- The hinge: don't boil itThe liquid should sit at a bare shiver, around 180F, for the whole cooking time. A rolling boil squeezes the muscle fibres and gives you dry, stringy ham no matter how good the Madeira finish is.
- SoakingThe instruction to soak assumes a dry-salt or heavily brined country ham, which needs 12-24 hours in changed cold water. A supermarket wet-cured ham needs no soaking at all; a genuine dry-cured country ham still does.
- Braising-panHere this just means a deep pot with a lid large enough to hold the joint covered by water. Any stockpot or oval roaster will do; a modern lidded "braiser" is usually too shallow.
- Wrapping in a clothA double thickness of muslin or cheesecloth, tied at both ends, keeps the joint from breaking up and makes it liftable. Butcher's twine and a well-rinsed tea towel work as well.
- Timing and donenessThe recipe defers to HAM, BOILED for the calculation; a rate of roughly 20-25 minutes per pound at a simmer is the usual figure and squares with the stated three to five hours. Go by an instant-read thermometer instead: 145-150F at the thickest point, away from the bone, for a raw cured ham; a supermarket ham labelled fully cooked only needs heating through.
- Green onionsScallions or spring onions, the three or four the recipe calls for, white and green. Probably not shallots, which the book tends to name outright.
- A bottle of MadeiraAround 750 ml, poured over a drained ham that no longer sits in liquid, so it acts as a shallow braise rather than a bath. Half a bottle of medium-dry Madeira topped up with the strained poaching liquor gives the same effect for less money; turn or baste the joint two or three times in the half hour.
- To glazeIn this period glazing means brushing the cooled ham with reduced, gelatinous meat stock or the reduced wine liquid until it shines, not the modern brown-sugar-and-mustard crust. Boil the wine down to a syrupy few spoonfuls and paint it on while the ham is still just warm.
- YieldA whole ham of 10-14 lb serves 20 or more, which is why it appears as a cold buffet centrepiece. It slices best fully chilled, the day after cooking.
Braising a ham after it has been poached, then finishing it in Madeira, is a French restaurant treatment that English cookery books absorbed wholesale in the nineteenth century -- hence the a la Francaise tag. The point of the second stage is aromatic rather than practical: the ham is already cooked, and the wine is there to perfume the outer inch of meat and reduce down into the glaze. Madeira and sherry held that role because both are fortified and keep, an important consideration in a kitchen without refrigeration. The "probable cost, 1s. per pound" is characteristic of the book, which priced almost everything so a household could budget a dinner in advance.