Why it works: Pepper and coriander match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,949 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓
To Cure Hams
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the ham
Choose a short, thick leg of a clean-fed hog.
Salt and spice
Rub the ham with 6 ounces of coarse sea salt and saltpetre.
After 2 days, rub in the remaining salt and spices.
Pound and mix the remaining ingredients well.
Cure in brine
Lay the ham in a trough, cover it, and baste with brine daily.
Turn the ham occasionally and rub with brine; make more brine if necessary.
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.
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Pepper + coriandertop 6% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together5,949 recipes
Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
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Ham + peppertop 23% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together6,058 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
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Sugar + coriandertop 31% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,749 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
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Sugar + peppertop 32% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together19,401 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Ham + sugartop 33% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together1,084 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
Sugar and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 19,401 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Saltpetre
- Helps preserve the meat and gives cured ham its characteristic pink colour.
- Coarse sea salt
- Draws moisture out of the meat and seasons it during curing.
- Coarse sugar
- Balances the salt with sweetness and adds flavour to the cure.
- Common salt
- Draws moisture out of the meat and seasons it during curing.
The step that matters
Rubbing in the remaining salt and spices after 2 days. Salt must be distributed evenly so the cure penetrates uniformly; uneven coverage leaves some areas under-salted and prone to spoilage, while the daily brine basting keeps the surface moist and the salt working inward.
Swap the coriander
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ham, sugar, pepper):
- Clovefits better
- Cinnamonfits better
- Allspicefits better
- Corianderthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against ham, sugar, pepper. 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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