Ham Smoked At Home
Ingredients
Directions
Set up the smoker
Fill an old cask, open at both ends, with oak sawdust.
Fasten a stick across the top to hang the hams.
Bury a bar of red-hot iron in the middle of the sawdust.
Smoke the hams
Cover the cask to keep in the smoke.
Maintain an even heat for four days for a large ham.
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
What each ingredient does
- Hams
- The main food being smoked, absorbing smoke flavour and firming as they dry slowly.
- Oak sawdust
- Smoulders to produce the smoke that flavours and preserves the meat.
- 1 bar of red-hot iron
- Supplies steady heat to smoulder the sawdust without open flame.
The step that matters
Maintain an even heat for four days for a large ham. Uneven heat can make the sawdust flare or go out, so the smoke becomes harsh or stops. Steady, low smouldering heat lets smoke penetrate and dry the meat gradually.
“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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