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Curing Hams

Curing hams by salting, sugar, saltpetre, cayenne, molasses, and smoking.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and molasses are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,225 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Curing Hams

Ingredients

Directions

Cure the meat

  1. Mix the salt, brown sugar, pounded saltpetre, and cayenne pepper well.

  2. Wet the mixture with molasses.

  3. Rub each ham and piece of meat on both sides with the mixture.

  4. Pack the meat in tubs, skin side down.

  5. Let the meat remain for four weeks.

Hang and smoke

  1. Hang the meat in a perfectly dark place.

  2. Smoke the meat constantly for three days with hickory.

  3. During damp spells in late winter or spring, make occasional smoke.

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. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Meat + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,777 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + molassestop 31% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together897 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Sugar + peppertop 32% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,401 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Meat + sugartop 34% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,866 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 19,401 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Fine salt
Draws out moisture and preserves the meat, slowing spoilage during the cure.
Brown sugar
Balances the salt and adds sweetness, softening the saltiness of the cured meat.
Pounded saltpetre
Supports curing by helping the meat keep its colour and resist spoilage over the long cure.
Hickory smoke (in the method)
Adds aroma and flavour and helps preserve the surface of the meat.

The step that matters

Ensure the meat is completely cold before salting, but do not allow it to freeze.. Salt penetrates and cures meat more evenly when it is chilled rather than warm, which helps limit spoilage at the surface. Freezing would stop the salt from absorbing properly and damage the meat's texture.

“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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