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Baked Ham

A ham baked with vinegar, hot water, mustard, and brown sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Vinegar and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,067 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Baked Ham

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Cover the ham with cold water and simmer gently until the skin loosens.

  2. Remove the skin and place the ham in a dripping pan.

Bake and glaze

  1. Pour vinegar and hot water mixed with mustard over the ham.

  2. Bake at 300°F (150°C) for two hours, basting with the liquid.

  3. Cover the ham with 1 inch of coarse brown sugar, pressing it down firmly.

  4. Do not baste again until the sugar forms a crust.

  5. Bake for an additional hour until the ham is a rich golden brown.

Cool

  1. Let the ham cool on a dish, pressing it with another dish and a weight.

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. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Ham + mustardtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together747 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  3. Vinegar + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

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

  4. Mustard + sugartop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,424 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Ham
The main meat, which the gentle simmering and baking cook through and keep tender.
Vinegar
Adds acidity and moisture to the basting liquid.
Mustard
Adds a sharp flavour to the basting liquid.
Coarse brown sugar
Melts and caramelises into a sweet, browned crust on the surface.

The step that matters

Leave the sugar alone until it forms a crust. Basting too soon wets the sugar before it has set, so it dissolves and runs off instead of forming a crisp, even glaze.

“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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