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Westphalia Ham, Roasted a LA St. James

A roast ham seasoned with mirepoix, wrapped in paper and paste, and infused with brandy or Malaga wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Ham and venison work together. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 85 recipes. Both carry 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline, which smells popcorn, roasted. The science ↓

Westphalia Ham, Roasted a LA St. James

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Prepare the Westphalia ham according to previous directions and steep it in mirepoix for the allotted time.

  2. Run a large iron skewer through the ham and fasten it to the spit with string.

  3. Cover the underside of the ham with reduced mirepoix and wrap the ham in oiled cartridge paper.

  4. Cover the paper with venison paste and tie it with greased paper and string.

Roast

  1. Roast the ham before a moderate fire for about five hours.

  2. After three and a half hours, make a hole in the paste and infuse with ½ pint of brandy or Malaga wine.

  3. Seal the hole with paste and roast for an additional twenty minutes.

Finish and serve

  1. Carefully remove the ham from the spit, trim it, and set it to dry on a baking sheet in the oven.

  2. Glaze the ham and serve it with the reserved essence for flavoring the sauce.

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 + venisontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85 recipes

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

  2. Flour + brandytop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,181 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Venison + flourtop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together667 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  4. Ham + brandytop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together61 recipes

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

  5. Venison + brandytop 32% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together27 recipes

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

What each ingredient does

Westphalia ham
Is the main meat, cured beforehand and then slowly roasted until tender.
Brandy or malaga wine
Adds aroma and sweetness as it infuses into the ham inside the paste casing.
Venison paste (flour and water paste)
Forms a sealed casing that traps moisture and steam around the ham while it roasts.
Mirepoix (vegetables and seasonings)
Flavours the ham from the outside and the reduced liquid gives the sauce its base.

The step that matters

Sealing the hole in the paste. If the opening is not sealed tightly again, steam and juices escape and the ham dries out during the final roasting.

“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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