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Removes of Ham

A ham braised with carrots, onions, celery, herbs, mace, cloves, and broth.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Removes of Ham

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the ham

  1. Scrape off any slimy surface from the ham before soaking.

  2. Soak the ham in cold water for a few hours if new, or 24 hours if seasoned. For foreign hams, soak for 2 to 4 days, changing the water every 12 hours in winter and twice in summer.

  3. Boil the soaked ham in water for 1 hour, then scrape and wash it in cold water.

Braise and cool

  1. Place the ham in a braising pan with carrots, onions, celery, herbs, mace, and cloves.

  2. Add enough broth to float the ham and braise gently on the stove for about 4 hours without boiling.

  3. Once done, remove the pan from the heat and let the ham cool in the braise to retain moisture.

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. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Carrot + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,873 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

  4. Celery + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,668 recipes

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

  5. Mace + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

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 being cured, softened and cooked slowly in liquid until tender.
Broth
Provides moist, gentle heat so the ham braises without drying out.
Carrots
Add sweetness and aromatic depth to the braising liquid.
Onions
Add savoury depth and sweetness to the braising liquid as they soften.
Celery
Adds aromatic, savoury flavour to the braising liquid.

The step that matters

Braising without boiling. Boiling the liquid makes the meat fibres tighten and toughen and can break the ham apart. A gentle simmer over about 4 hours lets collagen slowly convert to gelatin, leaving the ham tender and moist.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, carrot, onion, celery, clove. 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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