Ham is to Easter what turkey is to Thanksgiving and it’s best not to tamper too much with tradition. Of course, lamb is traditional if you happen to be Greek, but ham for Easter has come to be the unshakable custom in most American households.
Fortunately, with the enormous number of different kinds of hams available, there’s one to suit almost every purse and temperament, from expensive country hams that require two days of soaking and scrubbing and a long slow simmer to fully cooked, cured hams that only need warming in the oven. Somewhere in between these two extremes is the “fully cooked” ham that in fact has to be braised or baked to enhance its flavor and improve its texture.
Strictly speaking, ham comes only from the hind legs of a pig, though “picnic hams” from the shoulder are also marketed as ham. Unless boned, the shoulder is a tricky thing to carve. When buying half of a whole ham, ask for the shank as it is much easier to carve than the butt half.
Never buy hams that are labeled “water added,” and beware of canned hams unless you’re planning to have Easter dinner in an open boat with no cooking facilities whatsoever. Most hams bought in the supermarket have been pre-cooked to some degree, but what that degree is can be hard to find out so it’s best to braise or bake your ham quite thoroughly.
Braised Ham
Braising allows a partly-cooked ham to pick up some much-needed flavor supplied by wine, vegetables, and herbs. Old American and English cookbooks advise simmering hams in cider, but the cider they had in mind was unpasteurized natural hard cider which is not sweet. If you can get some of this you might try substituting it for the dry wine specified in the recipe below. Allow half a pound of ham, bone in, per person.
1 half ham (about 6 lbs.) or 1 whole ham (about 10 to 12 lbs.)
2 to 3 carrots, sliced
2 large onions, sliced
2 Tbsp. oil or butter
3 cups dry white or rose wine
1 bouquet garni: 2 sprigs parsley, 1 bay leaf, 1/2 tsp. thyme, 1/2 tsp. rosemary, tied in a cheesecloth bag
1 Tbsp. cracked black pepper
These amounts are for a half ham; more wine, cider, or water will be necessary to cook a whole ham. However, the vegetables and the bouquet garni can remain the same.
Preheat oven to 300 degrees Fahrenheit. Wash the ham in cold water and dry it. Gently simmer the carrots and onions in the oil until the onion is limp. Lay ham, skin side down, on top of the vegetables and add the bouquet garni, the wine, and enough water to come halfway up the sides of the ham. Add rather a lot of cracked pepper, at least one tablespoon.
Bring everything to the simmer, cover the pan, and braise in the oven for approximately 20 minutes to the pound. Baste it occasionally and turn the ham over halfway through its cooking time. The iliac bone near the shank can be pulled out easily when the ham is done. Cool the ham until you are able to handle it, then cut off the skin and pare the fat evenly so that there is a neat, smooth casing of fat about half an inch thick over the top of the ham. You can leave it as it is or score and glaze it with some melt? ed apricot jam or whatever your favorite glaze happens to be.
Bake it at 400 degrees the second time, just long enough to brown the fat and the glazing medium. Ham is at optimum flavor and texture at room temperature, so let it have a good long rest. Hot ham tends to fall into shreds. Chilled ham is, of course, the easiest to carve (but the flavor is best at room temperature).
Jambon Persille
Burgundy is famous for its hams and its monasteries and, among other things, the mustard of its capital city, Dijon. This glittering pink-and-green aspic of ham and parsley is a Burgundian Easter specialty. It is a spectacular way to use up leftover ham and is a wonderful buffet dish. Serves 12 to 14.
1/2 ham (about 6 lbs.) cooked
1 whole calf's foot, split
1 lb. cracked veal bones
About 4 cups of broth from the ham
1 cup fresh parsley, minced
1 Tbsp. white tarragon-flavored vinegar
Cook the ham according to the directions in the recipe for Braised Ham and add to the braising ingredients the calf's foot and the cracked veal bones to add gelatinous properties to the broth. If you can’t get these two items, use one envelope of plain, unflavored gelatine for each pint of stock to stiffen the aspic.
When the ham is done, skin it, cut away all the fat and gristle and discard the bone. Pull the meat to shreds except for about two cups which should be cut in small dice. Reduce the broth to four cups, strain it through damp cheesecloth laid in a sieve over a bowl, and put it into the freezer until the fat congeals. Remove the fat carefully and wipe the surface of the jellied broth with a damp paper towel.
Bring the broth to a simmer and clarify it by stirring into it the slightly beaten whites of two eggs. This will float to the top and form a cake, which should be very slowly simmered until the broth is clear, about 10 minutes or so. Lift off the egg white, discard it, and strain the broth through damp cheesecloth or a very fine sieve. Stir in the wine vinegar.
If you are using gelatine, soften it first in a little cold water; then stir it into the hot clarified broth to dissolve it completely. Stir in the wine vinegar. Cool this to lukewarm; then stir in the minced parsley. Chill a plain, round-bottomed, three-quart bowl (dishes with crevices are much harder to unmold) and line it with some of the half-set parsley aspic. Chill it. Mix the remaining parsley aspic with the ham and turn it into the aspic-lined bowl and chill very thoroughly. It’s a good idea to make this a couple of days in advance, at least one day in advance to give the aspic ample time for setting.
To unmold, loosen the edges of the Jambon Persille with a thin sharp knife, cover it with a lightly oiled round plate, and invert it. Cover the bottom and sides of the bowl with towels wrung out in very hot water until the aspic drops from its mold. (If you have a better technique for unmolding things, by all means employ it and send me the news, for I have always had moments of panic before trying to unmold various dishes.)
Cut the parsleyed ham into thin wedges and serve it with watercress and perhaps some hard-cooked eggs tinted in beet juice. This is a somewhat time-consuming but not at all difficult dish to make for festive occasions.
