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Baked Ham

A ham baked with brown sugar, cloves, bread crumbs, sherry wine, and soup stock.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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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 ↓

Baked Ham

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the ham

  1. After cooking the ham, remove it from the kettle and let it cool in the water until nearly cold.

  2. Peel off the skin and rub the ham with brown sugar.

  3. Stud the ham with cloves and sprinkle with bread crumbs.

Bake

  1. Place the ham in a double roaster.

  2. Pour Sherry wine and soup stock over the top.

  3. Bake in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C) until brown and tender.

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. Clove + sherrytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,237 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

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

  4. Bread + sherrytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together682 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Clove + winetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,958 recipes

    Shared aroma: cis-isoeugenol (clove, spicy).

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

What each ingredient does

Brown sugar
Caramelises on the surface during baking, adding sweetness and a browned glaze.
Sherry wine
Adds acidity and aroma to the liquid in the roaster, flavouring the ham as it bakes.
Soup stock
Provides moisture in the roaster, keeping the ham from drying out as it bakes.
Bread crumbs
Form a crust on the surface that helps the glaze brown during baking.

The step that matters

Bake until brown and tender. The ham is already cooked, so the oven mainly browns the surface and warms it through. Baking in a hot oven with liquid in the pan helps the sugar caramelise without drying the meat.

Swap the clove

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

  1. Cinnamonfits about as well
  2. Clovethe original
  3. Thymefits about as well
  4. Nutmegfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, sugar, bread, sherry, wine. 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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