Making Time for Air Dried Hams

Sometimes when all the pork comes back from the butcher it can be quite overwhelming deciding what to do with everything. By the time you've made a years supply of various sausages and salami there's little or no energy left for much else. Something we tried with our last pigs which were butchered in February was so freeze the joints we intended to air dry. We recently defrosted them when a few rainy days arrived and so a little time indoors was well spent preparing the hams. Once they have been frozen and defrosted they only need half the curing time in the salt in comparison to fresh pork.

With our first hams we followed the River Cottage dry cure recipe but this time we tweaked it a little, changing the amount of sugar (within safe curing guidelines), juniper and bay, and adding a couple of other herbs and spices.

I suppose with each batch we will tweak the cure mix and so I begin to appreciate how mixes become guarded secrets from various parts of the world where they have centuries of experience and have tweaked to perfection!

But somehow Leitrim Ham doesn't have the same ring to it as Parma Ham or Jamon de Serrano. Anyway, not that we'd ever want to part with it by selling.

Comments

[Robert]

I look forward to reading of your progress curing the ham. I read about your original success and it was great to learn that we can actually produce air dried meats in this climate.

[Péitseoga]

i think leitrim ham has a great ring to it!! there isn't enough irish local speciality food!

[peter flander]

I succeeded in making one "Serrano" type of ham by simply salting 4 weeks and hanging on the attic for 10 months in the climate of Finland. The result was perfect.
So I bought 20 raw hams and wanted to repeat. However, the butcher removed all the skin from the ham, to my despair. I decided to go ahead, and the hams are in the salting period now. How should I proceed to avoid too fast drying. Can T wrap the hams in a muslin cloth or some other kind of cloth to avoid too fast drying?