Recipe: The Perfect Baked Christmas Ham

During the first four years of my career I worked ham stations at hotel buffets. I became the “ham guy”, the person who could be relied upon to stud hams with perfect symmetry, and also smile while carving shimmering slices onto staid white hotel plates.

I wanted to be making parsley oils and other radical shit that I’d seen in Charlie Trotter’s first book, but that wasn’t what small town life had in store for me. No sir, if you wanted to ply your trade as a cook round here, you’d better wrap your head around ham.

I guess I still feel like I’m a ham guy. Some skills never leave you, and with a little time, maybe even a small amount of pride grows… as for parsley oil? Psst, that’s so 1994. Later, P-oil.

There is something lovely about being able to prepare a ham really well. Some simple rules apply—anything handmade and free-range will be tastier than anything from the supermarket. But I’ve prepared all sorts of hams over the years and, glazed properly, they all tasted pretty good. So buy the best you can afford. Ham on the bone tastes best to me, but they are huge, and I’ve had some memorable times with boneless hams, too. Whatever you choose, make sure it has the skin on.

To me, everything tastes better at Christmas, but I like glazed ham any time of the year. I’m preparing one tomorrow for some special friends.

1. Preheat oven to 180°C.

2. Remove any packaging. Lay on a chopping board with the skin side up. Pat dry with a paper towel.

3. If your ham is bone-in, use a very sharp knife to cut the skin and flesh around the hock end of the ham, all the way to the bone. Pull off this ham and skin (you can reserve it for soup or stocks later!) and use a boning knife to scrape the bone clean. The cleaner the bone, the better it looks after baking. If there is meat still left on here it will burn; it’s not the end of the world but professionals will always clean this thoroughly to prevent this. Your bone should look clean and unblemished if done correctly.

4. Using your hands, gently start pulling off the skin. Use your fingers and run them between the skin and the fat underneath to warm the fat and gently release the skin. Be patient with this step—it can take a while to take the skin off, but all the fat underneath is vital for this recipe, so you don’t want to be tearing it off with the skin.

5. After your skin is off, gently score the fat in a lattice pattern, creating little squares or diamonds (2cm by 2cm in size). Cut about 2 mm into the fat, taking care not to cut all the way through to the meat.

6. To stud with your whole cloves, press one, pointy side down, into each of the lattice squares/diamonds, until the whole fat cap on the ham is covered.

7. Take a pastry brush and gently brush the Dijon mustard over the fat, being careful not to disturb the cloves. I like to do a half-brush, half-stamping motion to save the cloves from being moved around.

8. Take a small amount of the brown sugar in your hand and press it onto the Dijon-coated fat, covering the whole layer of fat. It should stick to the fat and mustard.

9. Place the ham, fat side up, in a large roasting dish. Pour the orange juice into the bottom of the tray.

10. Cover with a layer of baking paper, then a layer of foil (shiny side towards the ham), giving it a little breathing room—you don’t want the foil tight against the ham. Ensure the sides are firmly attached over the edges of the baking tray so no steam can escape. You can use multiple sheets of foil if your ham is large.

11. Bake in the oven at 180°C for about 20 minutes per kg to gently warm the ham. As the ham is already cooked before purchase, it only needs to be warmed at this stage. An internal temperature of 60–65°C is what we are aiming for. If your ham is boneless, this stage might take less time, more like 15 minutes per kg.

12. Take the ham out of the oven and remove the foil and baking paper layers. Place the uncovered ham back in and increase the temperature to 190°C for 20 minutes, or until golden.

13. The ham should be caramelised now. Take it out of the oven again, and using a pastry brush, start brushing apricot jam over the fat. If your jam is too thick, warm it gently in the microwave or over the stove to make the consistency thinner and easier to brush.

14. Place back in the oven for a further 15 minutes, or until the fat looks deliciously caramelised.

15. Rest in a warm place for 15 minutes or so before serving. I like to take this to the table whole, on a platter, and carve in front of the family with my special ham knife (yes, I have a knife specifically for ham!). I also use the juices in the bottom of the roasting pan to drizzle over the ham slices after carving for some extra flavour.