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To Cure Hams

A method for curing a ham using salt, saltpetre, sugar, pepper, and coriander.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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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

  1. Choose a short, thick leg of a clean-fed hog.

  2. Rub 6 ounces of salt and saltpetre into the ham.

  3. After 2 days, rub in the remaining salt and spices.

Cure

  1. Pound the remaining ingredients and mix them well.

  2. Lay the ham in a trough, cover it, and baste with brine daily.

  3. Turn the ham occasionally and rub with brine; make more brine if necessary.

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. Pepper + coriandertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,949 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Ham + peppertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,058 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Sugar + coriandertop 31% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,749 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

  4. Sugar + peppertop 32% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,401 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Ham + sugartop 33% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked 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 the ham keep its pink colour and gives the cured meat its characteristic flavour.
Coarse sea salt
Draws moisture out of the meat and seasons it, slowing spoilage during the cure.
Coarse sugar
Balances the salt with sweetness and helps soften the harshness of the cure.
Black pepper
Adds aroma and warm flavour to the outside of the ham.

The step that matters

Turning and rubbing the ham with brine. The salt must penetrate evenly and the surface must stay wet with brine; uneven coverage or neglected turning lets some areas cure poorly and spoil.

Swap the coriander

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

  1. Clovefits better
  2. Cinnamonfits better
  3. Allspicefits better
  4. 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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