Fried Ham
The slices are always taken from a raw ham, but are most delicate when first simmered a short time: five minutes in a stewpan, dried with a clean cloth and put in a hot frying-pan, first removing the skin. The pan must be hot enough to scorch and brown both ham and gravy quickly. Lay the slices on a hot dish, pour into the gravy half a teacup new milk, pepper, and minced parsley; boil up and serve.--Mrs. S. T.
A method for pan-frying slices of Virginia salt-cured ham, with a quick milk gravy made in the pan. The whole thing turns on the brief simmer at the start and on not letting the slices linger in the fat.
- "Raw ham" means dry-cured, not freshThis is uncooked salt-cured country ham — the hard, dark, heavily salted kind sold as center-cut country ham slices, often labeled "cook before eating." Supermarket "ham" is already brined and cooked and will not behave the same way; it needs neither the simmer nor the scorching heat.
- The simmer is a de-salting stepThe simmer -- A brief simmer softens the slice and draws off some surface salt, though five minutes will only take the edge off a heavily cured ham; the recipe itself claims only that the slices come out "most delicate" this way. Drying the slice thoroughly afterward matters as much as the simmer: a wet surface steams instead of browning.
- Slice thicknessThe recipe gives no thickness. A slice of about a quarter-inch is a workable choice: much thicker and five minutes of simmering will not reach the interior; much thinner and the slices curl and go brittle in the hot pan.
- Cook it fastTwo to three minutes a side in a heavy pan over medium-high heat is plenty once the ham has been simmered. Country ham is lean and dense, and extended frying makes it fibrous and salt-sharp.
- "Half a teacup new milk"Teacup measures in nineteenth-century American books run anywhere from a half to three-quarters of a cup, so half a teacup is roughly 1/4 to 3/8 cup -- add it gradually and judge by how the gravy looks. "New milk" is simply fresh whole milk, unskimmed.
- Making the gravyPour the milk into the hot pan off the direct heat, scrape up the browned fond, then bring it back to a quick boil. If the pan drippings are very salty, the gravy will be too; a splash of water alongside the milk will thin the saltiness.
- Skin and fatRemove the rind before frying as directed, but leave the fat edge on — it renders and provides the frying medium. No added fat should be necessary in a well-seasoned pan.
- YieldThe recipe gives no yield; it speaks of frying several slices at once. Serve with something to take up the gravy.
Housekeeping in Old Virginia (1879), compiled by Marion Cabell Tyree from contributions by Virginia housewives -- hence the initials "Mrs. S. T." -- devotes considerable space to ham, because in Virginia the cured hog was the household's central asset. Hams were salted, sometimes sugar- and pepper-rubbed, smoked, and hung to age for months or longer, which is why the book can speak of taking slices from a "raw" ham and still expect them safe and palatable after five minutes in a stewpan: the curing, not the cooking, had done the preserving. The milk gravy here is a cousin of the better-known red-eye gravy, in which coffee or water rather than milk deglazes the pan; both exist because country ham drippings are too salty and too good to waste.