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Ham, Venison Style

Cold boiled ham simmered in a vinegar, currant jelly, mustard, pepper, and cider sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Vinegar and cider are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,431 recipes. Both carry 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol, which smells smoky, clove. The science ↓

Ham, Venison Style

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut slices of cold boiled ham.

Make the sauce and cook the ham

  1. In an enamel saucepan, combine vinegar, tart jelly, mustard, pepper, and sweet cider.

  2. Heat the mixture until steaming.

  3. Add enough ham to cover the bottom of the pan.

  4. Cook slowly for about 10 minutes, or until the liquid has nearly evaporated.

Serve

  1. Serve hot.

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. Vinegar + cidertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,431 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

  2. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

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

  4. Currant + cidertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together500 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  5. Mustard + cidertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,414 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

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

What each ingredient does

Tart jelly
Adds sweetness and acidity, and its pectin helps the sauce thicken as it reduces.
Vinegar
Provides sharp acidity that balances the sweetness of the jelly and cider.
Sweet cider
Supplies liquid and sweetness that reduces into a glaze coating the ham.
Cold boiled ham
The main protein; it warms through and takes on flavour from the reducing sauce.

The step that matters

Cook slowly until the liquid has nearly evaporated. Reducing the liquid concentrates the sugars and acids into a glaze. Cooking too hot can scorch the jelly's sugars and make the sauce bitter, while stopping too early leaves it thin and watery.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (vinegar, mustard, pepper, cider, ham):

  1. Applefits better
  2. Limefits better
  3. Plumfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, mustard, pepper, cider, ham. 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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