Curing Ham and Home Ham Curing Recipes - Dry, Salt Brine and Sugar Curing Methods (2024)

Curingham in somecountries, likeItaly for example, where makingprosciuttois as normal to them as home butchering.Meat curing is a useful skill to lean and part of homesteading and selfsufficient living. There are a number of ways to cure ham, includingdry curing which involves leaving it to cure by air, sugar curing,or brine curing where you use a lot of salt.

Curingmeat,and particularly curingham, is notalways easy, and the meat can often spoil when the conditions are notright, so care must be taken at all steps to be successful in the endand to make sure that you don't end up making yourself sick!

Because of this, it is easier to experiment with a side ofpork first before you attempt the whole leg of pork as it won't be atotaleconomic disaster if things go wrong.

Also a ham will take longer tocure and is more difficult as a curing process. Once you get the meat curingprocess right,yourham will keep for 6 months to a year.

There are 2 methods ofcuring ham, one is to drycure it where yourub a salt mixture into the pork and hang it up to dry, and the otheris a wet curewhere you place the pork in either a brine or a pickleand then hang it up to dry. The dry curing of ham is also calledcountry style curingand is a slow method and your meat will keeplonger this way than when cured using the wet cure method.

When curing ham make sure that your pork is not fatty. If you have afatty leg you will run the risk of your meat spoiling more easily thanif it is lean. Once you have killed your pigs make sure that the meatis chilled very quickly to prevent any spoiling taking place before youstart the ham curing process. Once your meat is chilled start thecuring process within 24 hours of slaughter, making sure that theinternal temperature of your meat is at least 40 degrees Fahrenheit.

I am going to give you 4different recipes for curing ham, all are different butequally good.The first two recipes arefor dry curing of ham and the other recipes are putting thelegs of pork in brine. If you live in a hot climate drycuring is not a goodidea as your meat will spoil and not be fit for human consumption.However, if you are going to cure your hams when the weatheris cold, for every day that the temperature reaches freezing point youshould add an extra day to your hamcuring process.

Grind all the herbs,Take 6oz saltpetre and mix well with the 20lb rock salt, then add theherbs and spices and mix thoroughly.

Wash the hams and dry thoroughly. Put a bed of salt in a container andlay the hams down, making sure the container has a hole in the bottomtolet excess fluid run off, Cover completely with the ingredients andleave until it is a good color.

After a week, break the pack, re-salt and place the hams skin down.Cover completely with salt and leave for one month. After a month takethem out, wash thoroughly and tie a piece of good quality cotton twinearound the hocks. Hang them up to mature for a week.

After a week, take them down and insert a long needle into each ham.Withdraw the needle and smell it. The aroma should smell fresh. If itdoes, take a small piece of fat, cover it with pepper and block thehole up with it; this prevents bacteria invading the ham.The next thingto do is to put the hams in the smoke house and smoke them using beech,for about a week. Take out cool, and put them in a cotton bag tomature.

These hams can keep for 12 months. They must be boned out verycarefully and left under a press to compact the shape.

When dry curing hamcover the hamscompletely with a layer of salt for 3 days. Once all thefluid has been removed, apply the curing mixture.

For the cure:mix together the saltpetre, salt, black pepper andcoriander, Bone out the leg of pork and then apply the ingredientsinside and out. Where you have taken the bone out, put some of theingredients in, using 1oz to 1lb and then sew up near the hock to givea good shape to the ham.

Put the leg in a curing net to keep the shape. Do not hang it up butlay it down so it does not lose its shape.

Cure for 10 days, then fetch it out and wash it off. Apply the garlicand wine vinegar to the dry ham and put under a wooden press. Pressinto shape and leave for another week or so until it is completelyhard. Take out the ham, rub it with garlic and vinegar and put in amuslin cloth.

Hang up in an airy place and leave for about a month. You mayfind mold when you remove it from the cloth.If the mold is white that is fine, just wipe it off with a cloth.However, if it is black this is not good, Rub it off with some morevinegar and re-wrap in a clean muslin.

Boil all the ingredientstogether for 20 minutes and cool beforepouring it over the meat. Find a large, clean container andplace the meat inside and cover with the brine mixture completely.

Leave it there for 3 weeks, then wash, and dry it off. Cover with apiece of muslin and hang it up to dry in an airy place.

You can also place it up the chimney and allow it to be smoked from thesmoke from the wood fire if your have a large enough chimney.

This sugar curing hamrecipeis a little different in that you salt up the ham first, and then placeit into a solution that is almost like a pickle concoction. It alsodoesn't contain any saltpetre so it is a safer and healthier option.

Take your pork leg and rub it withsalt for 3 consecutive days. Thensubmerge your salted pork leg in the following pickle solution for 3weeks.