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Boiled Ham

A ham boiled with water, sherry, and cloves, optionally baked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Sherry and clove are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,237 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Boiled Ham

Ingredients

Directions

Boil

  1. Cover the ham with cold water and bring to a boil.

  2. Boil for 30 minutes.

Cook in the cooker

  1. Add the sherry and transfer to the Caloric cooker for 6 to 8 hours using one radiator.

Finish and serve

  1. Remove from the water, cut off the rind, and stick whole cloves all over the ham.

  2. Bake for 30 minutes, or serve without baking.

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.

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. Sherry + clovetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,237 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Ham + sherrytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together377 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

  3. Ham + clovetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,666 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-decalactone (peach, creamy).

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

What each ingredient does

Ham
Provides the meat, which becomes tender through long, gentle cooking in liquid.
Sherry
Adds aroma and a mild flavour to the cooking liquid.

The step that matters

Keep the water at a gentle simmer. Vigorous boiling toughens the meat's proteins and can make the ham dry and stringy. A gentle simmer lets connective tissue soften slowly, so the ham stays tender and juicy.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ham, sherry):

  1. Clovethe original
  2. Thymefits about as well
  3. Celeryfits less well
  4. Marjoramfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, sherry. 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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