Skip to main content
Main

Ham, Boiled

A ham boiled with herbs, carrots, and bay leaf, optionally topped with browned bread crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Ham and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,536 recipes. Both carry 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline, which smells popcorn, roasted. The science ↓

Ham, Boiled

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak the ham in several changes of cold water for 8-24 hours, depending on saltiness.

  2. Scrub the ham and scrape off any discolored parts without cutting the skin.

  3. Place the ham in a large pot and cover it with cold water.

Cook

  1. Add sweet herbs, carrots, and a bay leaf for flavor.

  2. Bring the water to a boil slowly, skim off any foam, and simmer gently until cooked.

  3. For best taste, leave the ham in the water for an hour after cooking, if not storing long-term.

  4. Lift the ham out by the knuckle to avoid piercing it.

Finish and serve

  1. Remove the skin and sprinkle browned bread crumbs on top, if desired.

  2. Wrap a frill of white paper around the knuckle and serve on a warm dish.

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. Ham + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  2. Carrot + breadtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,628 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Ham + carrottop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,918 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
Provides the main meat, which is cured and salted, so soaking reduces its saltiness.
Sweet herbs
Add aromatic flavour to the cooking water that the ham absorbs as it simmers.
Carrots
Add gentle sweetness and aroma to the cooking liquid.
Bay leaf
Adds a subtle herbal aroma to the cooking liquid.

The step that matters

Bring the water to a boil slowly, then simmer gently. Boiling hard toughens the meat and makes the outer layers break down before the centre is cooked. Slow heating and a gentle simmer keep the ham tender and juicy, and skimming removes foam that can cloud the broth and spoil its flavour.

Swap the carrot

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

  1. Tomatofits better
  2. Mustardfits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Carrotthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, bread. 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.

More boiled ham recipes

Cold 4 See all 328 →

You might also like

Brown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesCarrot SoupCarrot Soup134 recipesWhite BreadWhite Bread80 recipesBread OmeletteBread Omelette60 recipes