SO EXCITIED OUR FIRST CIDER GLAZED HAM FROM OUR PIGS
I have had to be very patient, which I can do but did find a hint frustrating as I just wanted to get to the finished ham...12 days in the brine and then 24hrs soaking followed by 5 hours gentle simmering and 1 hr setting the glaze and Ta Da here she is in all her beautiful glory...
THE CIDER BRINE
INGREDIENTS FOR THE BRINE
1 ltr cider
4 ltrs apple juice
1kg dark brown sugar
700g black treacle
30g black peppercorns crushed
30 juniper berries crushed
10 cloves whole
10g salt petre
2kg salt
8 bay leaves
2ltr water
Bring all the brine ingredients to a rolling simmer and stir well, cook for approx 20 minutes until almost all the salt has been absorbed into the liquid, leave to cool and place in a plastic tub in the fridge preferably overnight to chill before placing you chilled leg of pork in to cure.
Leave your leg of pork to brine for 3.5 days per kilo. Remove and place in a large plastic tub and cover with cold water to soak for 24hrs. Take your cured leg out and place in a deep stock pot cover with water and throw in a couple of whole carrots, 3 sticks of celery, 10 black peppercorns, couple of bay leaves, 1 onion just halved and a crushed clove of garlic, bring to a gently just simmer and cook for 4-5 hours.
THE GLAZE
300g brown sugar
1 tbsp English mustard
10 cloves
100ml water
Remove from the stock pot and place on a shallow roasting tray, peel off the skin, it will just peel away easily, and then score the fat into a diamond pattern, paint over the mustard and then pat on the sugar, randomly stud the ham with the cloves. Pre-heat your oven to 180 degrees, add the water to the pan and bake your ham for 30-40 minutes, towards the end of the cooking time I like to baste the ham with some of the glaze that has collected in the bottom of the pan.
Leave to cool if you can before trying, this is a bit to tempting for me as it has been 14 days in the making and I just don't want to wait for a taste!!!
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