Make Your Own Cured Ham At Home
Ingredients:
4-6 lb Pork leg, shoulder or Boston butt - fat cap removed
***Weigh the pork with the scale set to grams, weight recorded
1 tbsp oil for searing purposes
The following is done by weight:
3 percent salt
1.5 percent sugar
.25 percent Prague powder #1
Add seasonings, ground not needed by weight
1 T coriander
Peppercorn medley
1 t clove
1/2 tsp cumin
1 t nutmeg
2 t cinnamon
1/2 tsp each of herbs, dried (thyme, sage, rosemary)
Tools needed:
Mixing bowl
Digital scale that weighs in grams
Wire whisk
Plastic wrap
Glass baking dish
Oven
Stove top
Foil
Large saute pan
***Smoke gun or hot smoker if you have one
How to make it:
Weight the pork on a Digital scale set to grams. Record the weight and use the percentages above to get the amount of salt, sugar and Prague powder #1 needed in grams.
For example:
The pork I made weighed 1749 g
Salt 3% = 52.47 g
Sugar 1.5% = 26.23 g
Curing Salt .25% = 4.37 g
If your scale doesn’t read decimal points, round to the next whole number. The percentage difference is minimal and still more accurate than using tbsp and tsp to measure with.
Rub pork everywhere and make sure to use up all of the salt cure. Wrap tightly in plastic wrap making a couple laps around the pork.
Cure 6 days for a 5-6 lb pork butt. Cure 4 days for a 3-4 lb pork butt. Flip pork over on day half way through the cure time.
After the pork is cured, rinse the pork under cold running water to remove all salt cure. It is very important to rinse all of the salt off of the pork. Curing salt is not to be ingested. Pat completely dry with a paper towel.
Pan sear on all sides in a very hot pan. This will take about 1-1/2 to 2. minutes per side depending on how hot your pan is. Rendering some fat and caramelizing it will result in a nice flavor in the end after it bakes.
Bake 325 for 2-1/2 to 3-1/2 hours until internal temperature reaches 145.
***5-7 lbs is roughly 18-24 minutes per pound.
If you have the means, smoking the pork adds a nice touch and flavor profile. I don’t have a hot smoker, though I do use my smoke gun that pumps cold smoke onto whatever I want to add smoke flavor to.
Smoke gun injects cold smoke onto whatever you’re smoking. I used it to smoke the pork today. Smokes cheeses well too.
Injecting cold smoke on the pork before placing it in the oven to bake. I wrapped the top of the pan tightly with foil with the hose on the smoke gun inside the pan. Some smoke will escape. I let the smoke fill the pan for 30 seconds. Pull the hose out, keep the foil wrapped tight so no smoke escapes. Place a lid over the foil if your able to do so to create a tighter seal.
If your don’t have a smoke gun, skip this step. Hot smoking your pork in a smoker is also great!
The color on the pork is great. It has a nice pink tone in the meat due to the curing process.
Enjoy!
Logan
