User:Macrakis/Glazed ham



Glazed ham is an American dish of ham baked with a sweet glaze, and often garnished with pineapples or other fruits. It is often served for holidays, as a Christmas ham, for example. A common presentation scores the rind into diamond shapes, with a clove at the center of each diamond.

History
Three quite different preparations have been called glazed ham:
 * Ham coated with meat stock and possibly sweet wine.
 * Ham coated with crumbs bound with egg.
 * Ham coated with sugar.

A jambon glacé is mentioned in the 1820 edition of André Viard's Cuisinier royal, the "glace légère" used to glaze likely based on unsweetened concentrated meat stock, as in the more explicit 1862 recipe in Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management.

An 1854 recipe glazes a ham with egg yolks and cracker crumbs.

Ham served with sugar existed in 18th century Spain, perhaps a remnant of the period before the strict separation of sweet and savory became widespread: "On y servit aussi un jambon... Mais il étoit couvert dúne certain dragée, que noun nommons en France de la non-pareille, & dont le sucre se fondit dans la graisse. Il étoit tout lardé d'écorces de citron, ce qui diminüoit bien de sa bonté. There were also brought to Table a Ham of Bacon... but it was spread all over with certain little Comfits, which in France we call Non-pareil, the Sugar of which melted into the Fat; it was drawn full of Limon peel, which abated much of its goodness"

- Madame d'Aulnoy, 1690

An 1846 dish called jambon glacé en surprise is not a ham at all, but a sweet sponge cake baked in the shape of a ham and iced with chocolate to look like meat.

Development of sweet glazed ham
An 1884 and an 1899 recipe call for 1/2 pound sugar for a 16 pound ham; one of the recipes also covers it with breadcrumbs. Fanny Farmer's Boston Cooking-School Cook Book in 1896 calls for "sprinkl[ing] with sugar and fine cracker crumbs" without giving quantities, and "stick[ing] with cloves one-half inch apart."

By 1915, a recipe for "Westphalian baked ham" coats the ham with 1/2 inch of sugar, and inserts cloves 1" apart, before baking for 45 minutes, than adds more sugar and bakes an addition 15 minutes. Similarly, a 1919 institutional recipe calls for 2 pounds of sugar for a 16 pound ham.

Honey-baked ham was later promoted by the American Honey Institute (1937)

In a magazine for honey producers in 1940, we find the modern form, in "Easter ham with honey apricot glaze". This recipe scores the fat and studs the resulting diamonds with whole cloves. The glaze consists of 2 cups of pureed canned apricots, 1/3 cup honey, and 2 tbsp vinegar.