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To Boil a Ham
M.
Wash and scrape the ham clean; put it on in cold water enough to cover it; put into the water two onions, two carrots, a head of celery, a dozen cloves and a handful of timothy hay; boil without stopping until the skin will readily peel from the ham; cover the ham with rolled crackers, or bread crumbs that have been browned and rolled, and bake in a slow oven for two hours.
A two-stage ham: simmered with aromatics, then crumb-coated and finished in the oven. Two things in the original need translating before you start — the hay, and what "ham" meant when this was written.
- The hay is not a misprintCooking ham in hay is a real practice, and the presumed point is the sweet, grassy aroma, as in the French jambon au foin. If you want to try it, use clean feed-grade or pet-grade timothy, not garden or field cuttings, which may carry herbicide or mould. Omitting it should cost you little more than a subtle background note.
- What kind of hamThis assumes a bone-in, dry-salt-cured, uncooked ham with the skin still on — a country ham or a modern uncooked bone-in ham. It will not work with a supermarket spiral-sliced ham, which is already fully cooked and will fall apart in the pot.
- Soak first if it is a country hamAn old-style salt-cured ham needs 12 to 24 hours in cold water, changed a few times, before it goes near the aromatics. Skip this and the cooking liquid and the meat itself will be too salty to eat.
- "Boil without stopping"Bring it up and then hold it at a bare simmer, around 180F. A hard rolling boil for hours toughens the muscle and shreds the outside before the centre is done. Figure roughly 20 to 25 minutes per pound, and confirm with a thermometer at the thickest point away from the bone.
- The skin test, and a numberThe skin peeling readily is a fair indicator, but check the interior: 145F for an uncooked ham, with a higher finish sometimes preferred for texture on a bone-in ham. The oven stage will carry it a little further.
- Slow ovenRoughly 275 to 300F. Two hours at that temperature suits a large ham; a smaller piece will likely need appreciably less to set the crust and glaze the surface.
- Rolled crackersCrackers crushed to crumbs with a rolling pin — plain soda or water crackers, not seasoned. The browned-and-rolled bread crumbs are the same thing made from oven-dried bread. Press the coating onto the peeled fat while the ham is still hot and tacky, or brush with a little mustard first so it holds.
- YieldAllow about 1/2 lb per person on a bone-in ham. A 10 lb ham serves roughly 15 to 20.
The Home Cook Book was compiled from contributions by "ladies of Toronto and chief cities and towns in Canada" in its Toronto edition (1877), following its American forerunner, the Chicago Home Cook Book (1874); sold for charity, its recipes are signed with initials — the "M." here is a contributor, not a measurement. Boiling a ham in hay is an old rural practice, often said to have come from farmhouse kitchens in France, where jambon au foin is still made; the sweet-grass smell it leaves on the meat is the whole point. The second stage, coating the peeled ham in cracker or bread crumbs and setting it in a cool oven, gave a boiled ham a crisp crumb crust for the table.