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Westphalia Ham, Roasted a LA St. James

A ham roasted with mirepoix, wrapped in paper and paste, and flavored with brandy or Malaga wine.

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 ↓

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 secure it with string at both ends.

  3. Reduce the mirepoix and cover the underside of the ham with it.

Encase and roast

  1. Wrap the ham in oiled cartridge paper and cover it with venison paste.

  2. Cover the paste with greased paper and tie it with string.

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

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

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

Finish and serve

  1. Carefully remove the ham from the spit and trim it.

  2. Set the ham to dry on a baking sheet in the oven, glaze it, and serve with the reserved essence for flavor.

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

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

  3. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Carrot + flourtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,029 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

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 cut being cooked, carrying most of the flavour and body of the dish.
Mirepoix
Vegetables that flavour the ham as it steeps and form the essence used for serving.
Brandy or malaga wine
Adds aromatic flavour and sweetness as it infuses into the ham during roasting.

The step that matters

Infusing the brandy or Malaga wine. Adding liquid through a hole in the sealed paste must be done quickly and resealed well, so the paste keeps steam and flavour inside and the ham does not dry out.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ham, carrot, celery, venison, flour, brandy):

  1. Turnipfits better
  2. Parsnipfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, carrot, celery, venison, flour, brandy. 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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