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Roasted Ham

A ham roasted with onions, carrots, bay leaves, and wine, then glazed and served with a reduced sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and carrot are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 21,601 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Roasted Ham

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Pare the ham on the underside and cut it into a round shape.

  2. Soak the ham to remove excess salt.

Marinate

  1. Place the ham in an earthen vessel with onions, carrots, and bay leaves.

  2. Pour the wine over the ham, cover with a cloth, and marinate for 24 hours.

Cook and serve

  1. Spit the ham and cook it, basting with the marinade.

  2. When nearly done, remove the skin, glaze, and brown the ham.

  3. Strain the marinade, reduce it to a sauce consistency, and serve it under the ham.

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. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Ham + oniontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,159 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  3. Carrot + winetop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,271 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-sec-butyl-2-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  4. Onion + winetop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,784 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Ham + carrottop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,918 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 that is soaked, marinated, cooked and glazed.
Malaga wine
Flavors the ham during marinating and becomes the base of the reduced sauce.
Onions
Add aromatic flavor to the marinade.
Carrots
Add aromatic sweetness to the marinade.
Bay leaves
Add aromatic herbal flavor to the marinade.

The step that matters

Reduce the marinade to a sauce consistency. Simmering the strained marinade concentrates its flavor and thickens it as water evaporates. Cooking it too little leaves a thin, weak sauce, while cooking it too long can make it overly salty and sticky.

Swap the carrot

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

  1. Tomatofits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Mustardfits about as well
  4. Carrotthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, onion, wine. 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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