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Potted Ham

Potted ham is a preserved ham made by boiling, grinding, seasoning, and canning.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Potted Ham

Why it works: Pepper and sage match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,388 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Potted Ham

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the ham

  1. Place 2 pounds of ham or shoulder in a kettle and cover with cold water.

  2. Add ¼ pound mace, ½ pound cloves, and 1 ounce bay leaves.

  3. Bring slowly to a boil and simmer for 4 hours.

  4. Remove the ham.

  5. Take off the skin and bone.

Season and pack

  1. Grind to a paste.

  2. Mix in 1 pound ground white pepper, 4 ounces ground cayenne pepper, 2 ounces powdered sage, and salt if necessary.

  3. Pack into cans. Cap. Tip.

  4. Process like beef.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Pepper + sagetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Clove + sagetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together731 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Mace + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  5. Mace + white peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,695 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Ham or shoulder
Provides the meat that is cooked tender and ground into a spreadable paste.
White pepper
Adds sharp, warm heat that seasons the paste throughout.
Cayenne pepper
Adds concentrated heat and a sharp, pungent bite.
Powdered sage
Contributes earthy, savoury aroma that rounds out the seasoning.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ham, mace, clove, pepper, sage):

  1. Allspicefits better
  2. Marjoramfits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, mace, clove, pepper, sage. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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