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Boiled Ham

A ham boiled with cloves, allspice, and brown sugar, then browned in the oven and sliced thin.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Boiled Ham

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the ham

  1. Soak the ham overnight in cold water.

  2. Wash the ham and scrape it clean.

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

Boil

  1. Boil slowly, allowing 15 minutes of cooking time for each pound of meat.

  2. Add a few whole cloves and the allspice to the water.

  3. Remove the ham from the kettle.

Glaze and bake

  1. Take off the skin.

  2. Cover the top of the ham with brown sugar and stick a few cloves into the ham.

  3. Set the ham in the oven at 400°F (200°C) to brown.

Serve

  1. Let the ham cool.

  2. Slice the ham very thin.

  3. Garnish the plate with parsley.

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. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Allspice + parsleytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,289 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Clove + parsleytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,768 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

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

  5. Ham + parsleytop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,249 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
Is the main cut of meat, which becomes tender and moist during long, slow simmering.
Brown sugar
Melts and caramelizes on the surface in the oven, adding sweetness and browning.
Whole cloves
Add a warm, aromatic flavor that infuses the ham and its surface.
Allspice
Adds a warm, aromatic flavor to the cooking water that carries into the meat.

The step that matters

Boil slowly. Simmering gently rather than at a hard boil keeps the meat tender and prevents the muscle fibers from toughening and drying out. Cooking time should be set by weight, so the ham is fully cooked through.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Gingerfits better
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, clove, allspice, sugar. 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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