Warwickshire Ham

From:

THE WHOLE ART or  CURING, PICKLING, AND SMOKING  MEAT AND FISH,

Both in the British and Foreign Modes . . .

By JAMES ROBINSON, EIGHTEEN YEARS A PRACTICAL CURER.

PRINTED FOR  LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN, AND LONGMANS, PATERNOSTER- ROW.  London, 1847.

Page 72

A WARWICKSHIRE HAM.

The finest flavoured and mellowest ham I ever partook of was cured in Warwickshire from the following receipt. It weighed twenty seven pounds and was cut from a hog that had been singed instead of scalded. Rub the leg of pork with two ounces of saltpetre finely beaten in all parts particularly about the hip joint and let it lie twenty four hours Then take:

Rain or river water 1 gallon

Pale dried malt 1 peck

Sugar or treacle 1 lb

Bay salt, broken 1 1/2 lb

Common salt 2 1/2 lbs

Shalots or onions in slices 3 oz

Boil all these together ten minutes and skim the pickle well until no more scum appears. Pour it hot over the meat and let the grains remain covering it until they begin to be sticky when they may be drained in a hair sieve and dismissed. Keep the ham well covered with the pickle and turned and rubbed every day for three weeks when it may be taken out dried with cloths and smoked three weeks or a month Put it in a box with malt dust all around it and cover it from the air with sand that has been dried in an oven for a week.

Saltpetre (saltpeter) is sodium nitrite. In it's place for a 25 pound ham use 1/2 oz. of red salt.
1 gallon U.K. is 160 fluid ounces, not the U.S. 128 fluid ozs.

Pale dried malt is available at home brewing shops. Obtain 8 1/2 pounds of it. In October 2009, domestic malt is $1.25 a pound.

By river or rain water is meant soft water.

By common salt is meant salt without sodium nitrate or nitrite. Any salt will do, by weight.