Ham Days

The annual "Eight Days of Ham” (™ the Foodie Daughter) have once again arrived.

Fortunately for us, this time we had reinforcements.

The ham doesn't stand a chance.

My husband received this lovely 18 pound, Petit Jean Meats bone-in, smoked and fully cooked ham for Christmas.

We have never been disappointed by these hams.

The glaze for the ham is simple with a bit of mustard and equal parts pineapple juice and brown sugar.

The Foodie Boyfriend loves pineapple, so I skewered pineapple slices to the ham after I had scored the flesh with a sharp knife.




I baked the ham according to the directions on the wrapping, basting after the first half hour.
Interestingly, the directions that came in the box with the ham gave a shorter cook time.

Next year I will follow the box directions and not cook the ham quite as long.





This was still a lovely ham, though.

And don't worry, there was plenty left over for the remaining
Seven Days of Ham.





See, I told you.
I weighed out 1-1/2 pounds of ham for a ham loaf (front dish).
The remainder will be used for other dishes.




*
The Second Day of Ham
And the Third,
And the Fourth,
And the Fifth,
And the Sixth,
And the Seventh,
And the Eighth.
(It turns out that the Foodie Boyfriend really, really likes ham salad.)


I weighed out (what, me anal?) one pound of ham for ham salad.
I also have:
mayonnaise
honey mustard
sweet relish
celery
red onion.




I cut everything into a nice mince.
A food processor could be used, but then this would be more of a puree,
and that was not the texture that I wanted.

After tasting, I opted to add about a teaspoon of sugar to cut some of the saltiness from the mayonnaise.







Very nice.

I love ham salad on lightly toasted bread with a bit of Swiss cheese.

By the time the Eight Days of Ham had ended I had cut up, by hand,

about 4-1/2 pounds of the ham for ham salad.






*

The Third Day of Ham

Ham Loaf

My mise en place:

ham

eggs

onion

evaporated milk

ground dry mustard

black pepper

Half-and-Half

brown sugar

bread crumbs

The ingredients for the glaze are:

apple jelly

lemon juice

ground dry mustard

brown sugar

The food processor was used this time.

The Foodie Boyfriend suggested adding bacon to the top of the ham loaf, so I chopped up a couple of slices of cooked bacon and sprinkled that on top.


The glaze is added towards the end of the baking time.

This almost makes me sad that we only do this just once a year.