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Baked Ham

A ham coated in batter, baked, then topped with sugar, pepper, crackers, cloves, and cinnamon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Baked Ham

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare and bake

  1. Soak the ham in clean water for 1 hour and wipe it dry.

  2. Spread thin batter all over the ham.

  3. Place the ham in a deep dish with sticks underneath to keep it out of the gravy.

  4. Bake for 6 to 8 hours until fully cooked.

Finish and glaze

  1. Remove the skin and batter crust from the flesh side.

  2. Let the ham cool.

  3. Sprinkle 2 tablespoons of sugar, black pepper, and powdered crackers over the ham.

  4. Return the ham to the oven to brown.

  5. Insert cloves into the fat.

  6. Dust the ham with powdered cinnamon.

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. Clove + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Pepper + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,890 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  4. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Ham + clovetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,666 recipes

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

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Ham
Is the main cut that is slowly cooked until fully done and then finished.
Thin batter
Forms a protective crust over the ham during baking, which is later removed.
Sugar
Caramelizes on the surface when heated, adding sweetness and browning.
Cloves
Add a warm, aromatic spice flavor that infuses the fat as the ham cooks.
Powdered cinnamon
Adds a sweet, aromatic spice finish to the surface of the ham.

The step that matters

Return the ham to the oven to brown. Sugar on the surface caramelizes and darkens quickly in heat, so it can scorch if left unattended. Watch the surface closely until it is evenly browned.

Swap the cinnamon

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

  1. Cinnamonthe original
  2. Allspicefits about as well
  3. Nutmegfits less well
  4. Marjoramfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, sugar, pepper, 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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