No. 1792

Virginia Ham with Stringed Eggs (jambon de Virginie aux

Œufs Files

This dish is a favorite one among Spanish people. Select the ham from a young pig, pare and cook it the same as the boiled ham with spinach (No. 1791); when done, drain and cut off the rind, pare the upper surface evenly, and wipe the fat over with a cloth, besprinkle with a thin layer of powdered sugar and glaze it either under a salamander (Fig. 123) or in a very hot oven. Trim the handle with a frill (No. 10) and dress on a low, carved rice socle, placed on a long dish. Break sixteen fresh eggs, place the yolks in a bowl and pound them without beating, then rub them through a strainer, and to poach them resemble coarse vermicelli; for this result it is necessary to have an oblong, wide-mouthed strainer, its aperture being six inches long by three wide and two inches and a half deep; the bottom must be furnished with six tin tubes shaped like a socket, having an opening at the bottom an eighth of an inch or less wide and soldered on the outside. Have a sugar pan of sufficient size and half full of twelve degrees hot syrup; keep the strainer on top of this boiling syrup, and pour the strained eggs into it, letting them fall through into the syrup; as quickly as they harden lift them out and spread in a sieve dampened with water, so that these strings do not adhere to one another, then dress them around the ham. Madeira sauce (No. 492) may be served separately.

← No. 1791 Ham with Spinach-Boiled Pork No. 1793 Pigs' Heads with Puree of Split Green Peas →

For the Modern Kitchen

Ranhofer is doing two things here: a glazed country ham, and the Iberian confection of egg yolks spun into threads in hot syrup. The threads are the difficult half, and they fail for one reason — air in the yolks.

Pound the yolks, do not beat themAny foam whipped into the yolks turns to bubbles and broken strands in the syrup. Stir and press them smooth, then push them through a fine sieve to break the germ and the membrane fragments so they flow evenly.
"Twelve degrees hot syrup"Degrees on a nineteenth-century syrup saccharometer are Baume; 12 degrees Baume is roughly 22 Brix, a fairly thin syrup. Test with a few drops of yolk before committing the lot.
The strainerThe six-tube vessel described was a purpose-made tool. A piping bag with the finest plain tip, a squeeze bottle, or a small funnel with a pinhole does the same job; the yolk should fall in a continuous thread, not drops.
SalamanderAn iron plate heated red and held over food to brown it. A broiler on high, or a very hot oven at 475-500F for a few minutes, glazes the sugared fat the same way.
Virginia ham means dry-curedA genuine salt-cured country ham needs long soaking, often 12 to 24 hours with changes of water, before simmering, or it will be inedibly salty. A modern wet-cured supermarket ham is already cooked and mild, and needs neither the soaking nor the long boil.
Rice socle and frillA socle is a molded pedestal — here cooked rice pressed into a shape and carved — built to raise the ham for display. It is pure banquet dressing; a warmed platter serves. The frill is the paper ruffle on the exposed bone.
YieldSixteen yolks make a generous nest of threads. Spread them on a damp sieve as directed or they weld into a single mass.
SauceThe Madeira sauce is optional and served apart. The sugared glaze and the sweet egg threads already carry the dish.

A Little History

Ranhofer calls this a Spanish favorite, and huevos hilados — spun eggs — is indeed the Spanish name, though the technique is generally traced to the convent kitchens of Portugal, where it is fios de ovos. Those kitchens are often said to have had yolks to spare: by the traditional explanation, egg whites were used in quantity for clarifying wine and for starching habits, leaving nuns to invent sugar-and-yolk sweets by the dozen. Portuguese traders and missionaries carried the trick outward in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, which is why near-identical golden threads appear as foi thong in Thailand and keiran somen in Japan. Pairing them with a glazed Virginia ham gives a native American cured ham dressed with a European court garnish, mounted on a carved rice pedestal for a dining room that expected its meat to arrive as architecture.