We always enjoy a cooked ham on Christmas Day. Now, when we were little my Mum would cook our family ham the night before for a special Christmas Eve dinner, we would eat ham and eggs on toast on Christmas morning and then head off to one set of Grandparents for lunch {where there would be ham} and one set of Grandparents for dinner {where there would also be ham}. Now that my parents are the Grandparents, they cook their ham on Christmas Day and we enjoy the ham again on Boxing Day with Great Grandparents.
I think it is fare to say that I have had my share of Christmas ham and I would have to say that this is my most favourite Christmas ham recipe. This ham tastes delicious both hot and then cold on toast for many a day to come. I even think that this ham bone makes the best pea and ham soup {once all your ham is gone – wrap your bone and place in the freezer for the colder, soup making months}.
And the crazy thing is that I only eat Christmas ham – I don’t like ham from the deli {I guess that’s a good thing – seeing as eating too much is said to be linked to cancer}.
- CHRISTMAS HAM
- 1 large Christmas Ham
- 1 cup orange juice
- ½ cup maple syrup
- ½ cup brown sugar
- 2 tsp Dijon mustard
- 20 cloves
- In a small saucepan place the orange juice, maple syrup, brown sugar and mustard. Stir until the sugar has dissolved and leave to simmer.
- In the meantime, remove the ham from the plastic and carefully slice on the top layer of skin, with the aim of leaving behind as much of the fat as possible. Score the fat diagonally and then diagonally the other way so that it makes a diamond pattern in the fat. Where two lines meet place a clove (note you may not need all of the clove or you may need more depending on the size of your ham).
- Return to the glaze, remove it from the heat. When your ham is sitting in an oven proof/ BBQ proof tray, pour half of the glaze over the top and then transfer it to the BBQ which should be on low and cover with a lid . Cook the ham for 3 hours, adding extra glaze each hour. If you notice that the ham is beginning to burn cover with some foil.
- Remove all of the cloves before carving - enjoy with lots of Christmas cheer.
The face you make when there is no more Christmas ham left
Do you cook a ham on Christmas day? Do you cook more then one protein – like a ham and a turkey, or ham and seafood, or a turkey and a duck and a chicken {all stuffed inside one another}? If you whip up a recipe from GoodFoodWeek during the silly season, I would love to see it social media – don’t forget to use the hashtag #goodfoodweek.
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