[harry]

Anyone made ham in their kitchen, is so how did you do it,

[tizaala]

Do you refer to boiled ham, cured ham, air dryed, Palma style etc.

Are you leaving the bone in the leg or taking it out?

for curing all you need is a large plastic box with lid , sea salt (refered to sometimes a kosher salt) and some demerara sugar  .
If you have a plastic cake cooling rack ( dont use metal because of the salt) place it in the bottom of the box,
rub the mix of salt and sugar all over the ham and place on the cake rack, if you have removed the bone get plenty inside the cavity,
the salt will draw all the moisture from the ham and the bottom of the box will fill with the liquid,. Drain the juice off daily and turn and re-salt the ham untill no more liquid comes out,  for air drying you then wrap in cheese cloth or muslin and hang it to dry.
Have a look at River cottage cook book.

[Anke]

HFW Rivercottage cookbook - works a treat for any kind of ham. We have hung a whole (tunnel)boned leg in our garage over winter - really nice ham, then kept in the bottom of the fridge over summer and slowly eaten.

[oaklandspigs]

I am a fan of wet curing, produces great ham.

We buy the mix from Sausagemaking.org - you can get lots of different cures. The butcher takes the leg bone out, this help it cure without using brine syringes.

The mix comes with instructions x amount of mix to y amount of water for z amount of meat.  Just mix and place the joint inside a plastic bag with the mixture and tie the top.  Place inside a plastic container to support the bag - you can buy lots of large tuperware boxes nowadays. If doing at this time of year you can leave in a cooll place eg garage, if doing in warmer weather a fridge is good.  Then leave for the required amount of time, usually 2 weeks for off the bone, 3 for on.  Once the joint reaches equilibrium it doesn't get any saltier.

We then honey roast, slice and freeze 4-8 slices, means you can get out just what you need, and tastes great.

Suspect I'll be described as a philistine by dry cure fans, and believe me I am not knocking dry cure - go for whatever suits you.

[JEP]

how do you do honey roast

[JulieS]

I'm with you oaklands, I prefer a wet cure for my hams.  I prefer the texture of the finished result.  I do dry cure the occasional ham to get a 'parma' style.

Not sure how everyone else honey roasts, but I simmer as usual in a saucepan of water with whichever herbs and flavours you would like.

About 1/2 hour before the end of the cooking time take out of the water, remove the rind.  Then make a 'criss cross' pattern in the fat and cover with whichever glaze you would like......In this case a honey based one.

Finish off the cooking in a hot oven basting with the glaze regularly.

At the end of cooking you can wrap in greaseproof paper and tinfoil and allow it to slowly cool down in it's juices.   I vac pack when still warm - the flavour of the glaze seems to get right into the ham.

When completely cold unwrap, wipe off and then bag and put into the fridge until needed.  (Or, like oaklands, slice  and freeze in usable quanities.......great idea Oaklands, I'm going to 'borrow' that one).