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Boiled Ham

A ham boiled in vinegar, water, bay leaves, thyme, parsley, then roasted with bread crust and powdered sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Home for the Friendless (Chicago, Ill.) · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Boiled Ham

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the ham

  1. Take a ham weighing about eight or ten pounds.

  2. Soak it for twelve or twenty-four hours in cold water.

  3. Cover it with boiling water, add one pint of vinegar, two or three bay leaves, a little bunch of thyme and parsley (dried and sifted or seeds if fresh not available).

Boil and trim

  1. Boil very slowly for two hours and a half.

  2. Take it out, skim it, remove all the fat except a layer half an inch thick.

  3. Cut off with a sharp knife all the black-looking outside.

Glaze and bake

  1. Put the ham into a dripping pan, fat side uppermost.

  2. Grate bread crust over it and sprinkle a teaspoon of powdered sugar over it.

  3. Put it in the oven for half an hour until it is a beautiful brown.

Serve and use up

  1. Eat cold; cut the nicest portion in slices.

  2. Chop the ragged parts and odds and ends finely and use for sandwiches.

  3. Alternatively, add three eggs to one pint of chopped ham, fry brown to make an omelet.

  4. Put the bones in a soup kettle, render and strain the rind and fat for frying potatoes and crullers.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

280Calories
28 gProtein
11 gFat
16 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 6 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Ham100g cooked145
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Thyme1 tsp dried (1.4g)4
Vinegar1 tbsp (15ml) distilled3
Parsley1 tbsp chopped fresh (3.8g)1

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Home for the Friendless (Chicago, Ill.). 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. See the original page.

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. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Vinegar + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Vinegar + parsleytop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,477 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Vinegar + thymetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,305 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Ham + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,526 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Ham
Is the main joint that is boiled, then baked to a brown finish.
Vinegar
Added to the boiling water, it adds a faint sharpness to the cooking liquid.
Powdered sugar
Sprinkled over the ham, it helps the surface caramelise and brown in the oven.
Bay leaves
Add a subtle aromatic flavour to the cooking liquid.
Eggs
Bind and set when fried with chopped ham to make an omelet.

The step that matters

Boil very slowly for two hours and a half. Boiling hard can toughen the meat and make it dry and stringy. A slow simmer cooks the ham gently, keeping it tender and juicy.

Swap the thyme

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (vinegar, ham, sugar, egg, parsley):

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Capersfits about as well
  3. Nutmegfits about as well
  4. Thymethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, ham, sugar, egg, parsley. 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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