Skip to main content
Dessert

To Dress Hams

A method for preparing hams by soaking, mellowing, simmering, and dressing with raspings and carrot garnish.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Ham and carrot are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,918 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

To Dress Hams

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the ham

  1. Soak the ham in water overnight.

  2. Mellow the ham for 2-3 days in a hole in the earth or on damp stones, covered with a heavy tub.

  3. Wash the ham thoroughly.

Cook the ham

  1. Place the ham in a large pot with plenty of water and simmer for 4-6 hours, depending on size.

  2. If serving later, cover the ham with a clean, doubled cloth and keep it warm over boiling water.

Finish and serve

  1. Remove the skin and sprinkle raspings over the ham.

  2. Garnish with carrot.

  3. Preserve the skin to cover the ham when cold to prevent drying.

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 + carrottop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,918 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Ham
Is the main dish, so its size and cooking time set how long the simmer must run.
Raspings
Sprinkled over the ham to add a crumb-like topping on the surface.

The step that matters

Simmer the ham gently for the full time. Simmering in plenty of water cooks the ham through slowly, and cooking time must match its size. Too short leaves the centre underdone; a hard boil can toughen the meat.

“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.

You might also like

White CakeWhite Cake431 recipesPound CakePound Cake373 recipesOrange Bundt CakeOrange Bundt Cake349 recipesSpice CakeSpice Cake344 recipes