Five weeks of trimming, curing, drying, smoking, and aging are coming to an end. I finished my 2024/2025 batch of hams.
Just like the years before I used the slow weeks of winter and the cold weather to make some ham. It’s become a nice hobby at this point and something for me to tinker with during the winter months. I’m still fascinated by the process of taking raw meat and preserving it for months simply by drying and smoking it over a long period of time.
This year I went with leaner cuts than before. No skin, not a lot of fat. I got three different cuts of pork (Lachs, Hüfte and Nuss are the German terms) from a local butcher. The butcher I usually got my meat from retired and closed their shop for good so I had to go with a different one this year.
Today I cut the first ham and the results are pretty promising so far. The weather conditions haven’t been ideal while during the smoking phase, which might have led to a stronger bark building up but I might be able to reverse that by vacuum sealing the ham for a few days. I went with the same recipe as last year: curing salt, allspice, brown sugar (for the color mostly), garlic powder and black pepper. As a special I added some juniper berries, but I’m not sold whether or not they made a huge difference just yet. Smoked over beech wood for 4 x 12 hours.
Anyways, here are the results. I’m going to pack them nicely and share most of it with friends and neighbors. Most of the rest will end up on my Butterbrot, a snack, or as a Pizza topping.
Pork, vacuum sealed and ready to be cured for 2 weeks
Cured and hanging to try
All done. Sliced and ready to go. And yes, I messed up and sliced with the grain.