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Boiled Ham

Boiled ham seasoned with cloves and bread crumbs, then baked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 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 ↓

Boiled Ham

Ingredients

Directions

Boil the ham

  1. Wash and scrape the ham clean in warm water.

  2. Place the ham in a large kettle and cover it with hot water.

  3. Cover the kettle and boil the ham for 2 hours for an 8 to 10 pound ham, or 2.5 hours for a larger one.

  4. Let the ham stand in the water until cold.

  5. Remove the skin from the ham.

Finish and bake

  1. Stick cloves into the fatty part of the ham.

  2. Dust the ham with cracked bread crumbs and bake for 30 minutes.

  3. Serve the ham hot.

Cool and slice

  1. Let the ham cool for 24 hours before slicing for cold serving.

  2. Cut down inward along the bone crosswise for juicy slices.

  3. Cut a thicker slice of ham.

  4. Heat a frying pan.

  5. Sear the slice on both sides.

  6. Serve the seared slice.

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 + breadtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,129 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Ham
Provides the main meat, which is cooked slowly in water until tender.
Cracked bread crumbs
Form a crust on the surface as they bake, adding light browning and texture.
Cloves
Add a warm, aromatic spice flavour to the fatty surface of the ham.

The step that matters

Boil for the stated time. Boiling for too long can toughen and dry out the meat. Timing by ham size keeps the meat tender and juicy while it cooks through.

Swap the clove

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

  1. Marjoramfits about as well
  2. Clovethe original
  3. Celeryfits about as well
  4. Capersfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, bread. 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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