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Ham

A ham pickled with sugar, salt, saltpetre, and vinegar, then smoked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 20,806 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Ham

Ingredients

Directions

Salt and drain

  1. Rub the ham well with common salt and let it drain for 1-2 days.

Pickle

  1. Rub in the sugar, salt, saltpetre, and vinegar in the specified proportions.

  2. Turn the ham every other day.

  3. Keep the ham in the pickle for 1 month.

Smoke

  1. After pickling, drain and smoke the ham over a wood fire for 3-4 weeks.

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 + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  2. Ham + vinegartop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together737 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-methylbutanol (malty, whiskey).

  3. Ham + sugartop 33% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,084 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

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

What each ingredient does

Ham
The main cut that is cured, firmed and preserved by the salt mixture.
Salt
Draws moisture out of the meat and seasons it while helping preserve it.
Coarse sugar
Balances the saltiness and adds sweetness to the cured meat.
Saltpetre
Helps cure the meat, giving it a stable pink colour and a cured flavour.
Vinegar
Adds acidity and tang to the pickle.

The step that matters

Turn the ham every other day. Salt and saltpetre penetrate meat slowly and unevenly. Turning the ham keeps the cure in contact with every surface so the cure reaches evenly through the joint.

“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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