Home-made Cured Ham
Make your own cured ham just like the Italians
Equipment
- Food Processor
- 5 litre Bucket with lid
- Butcher's String
- Meat Hook
Ingredients
- 1 whole Chump End Pork Loin (deboned)
- 3 kg Fine Salt (enough to cover pork in bucket)
Aromatics
- 1 tbsp Juniper Berries
- 1 tbsp Coriander Seeds
- 1 tbsp Fennel Seeds
- 1 tbsp Black Peppercorns
- 1 tbsp Red Peppercorns
- 1 tbsp Green Peppercorns
- 2 sprigs Rosemary (fresh)
- 6 sprigs Thyme (fresh)
Instructions
- First toast the coriander and fennel seeds. Then with the rest of the aromatics, roughly crush in a food processor.
- Tightly tie up your meat with butcher's string and rub the aromatics on all surface of the pork.
- Put some salt at the bottom of the bucket. Then lower the pork in the centre of the bucket and cover with the remaining salt. Put on lid and refrigerate for 3 days for every 1kg of meat. The piece we had was around 2.5kg so we salted it for 8 days.
- After one to two days you will notice the salt at the bottom of the bucket to be very wet. Therefore every second day take the pork and salt out of the bucket. With clean hands, mix the salt around and re-set the bucket but this time placing the pork the opposite side down. Repeat every 2 days.
- Once the salt brining process is ready, remove the pork from the salt and dust clean of any remaining salt. Lightly rinse the pork with some cold water.Then with a butcher's hook, hang the pork in a fridge for 2 months. It is essential that nothing makes contact with the pork within the fridge to prevent any cross-contamination.
- After 2 months of dry-aging in the fridge you can remove the butcher's string and slice to serve. Wrap with cling film and store within an air-tight container.
Notes
It would be really useful if you have a fridge which is not in use. Apart from needing the extra space, this prevents day-to-day contact with other items in the fridge. But also you can set the temperature of the fridge upwards to around 7°C-8°C degrees. This helps speed up the dry-aging because cold temperatures can prolong the process.