A lot has changed since the New York Times ran an article on Southern Maryland Stuffed Ham in 1982. That article described stuffed ham as a curious, acquired taste. “Occasionally one hears of a newcomer – a visitor, even – whose sensitive palate quivers with delight at the first piquant bite,” wrote the article’s author, Mary Z. Gray. “For those who can take it, the dish is especially savored because it is available only in southern Maryland.”
Nowadays, we live in an age of commodification and a collectors’ mentality about foods to try. The nebulous concept of ‘authenticity’ offers an alluring selling point to many diners. The comments on the Times’ March 2018 article about stuffed ham generally fall into two categories: fond reminisces or “I gotta try this!”
I haven’t had stuffed ham since I finished the final frozen remains of last year’s attempt. I’m pretty sure I swore off the process of ever making stuffed ham again, but that damned Times article just made the temptation too much to bear.
Originally, I had intended to work on a variation of former City Paper food writer Henry Hong’s “Fake Ass Stuffed Ham.” Hong is one of the few brave souls who have attempted to adapt the process to something a little more practical. Hong’s recipe called for a Boston Butt which is brined overnight before being rolled up with the requisite stuffings.
With a week until Easter, I decided I’d brine the ham with pink curing salt for a week for a flavor more similar to the Manger Packing Corporation’s hams (which contain nitrite).
This necessitated that I buy the meat that very day. I ended up leaving several grocery stores and a butcher shop empty-handed before finally catching a ride to Giant. Giant happened to have fresh hams so I ended up dropping the whole Boston Butt thing and going with a ham. From there I abandoned any attempt to make this easy.
Kind of makes this entire post pointless, doesn’t it?
Some key differences from last time:
- I cut off all that tough skin from the ham. None of my recipes specify to do that for some reason (perhaps it should be obvious?) but some of the recipes online do, and it was an improvement. I may throw the cut-away parts in some scrapple or something.
- This ham brined for a week in my fridge. I’d like to try it again and give it a full month.
- I blanched the greens and chopped them in a food processor instead of hand-chopping. Definitely the way to go! I also used the mini-chopper to process a lot of black and red pepper.
- Last but not least…. I de-boned the ham. After watching some youtube videos I took a deep breath and gave it a try. Not the most elegant operation, but I was able to use much more stuffing.
I cut some slits outward from the “bone hole,” and then I cut some additional outer slits in the spaces between them. The whole time, I recalled this quote from Rob Kasper’s article on Stuffed Ham in the Baltimore Sun in 1988:
“Ham Bone advocates cook the ham with the bone still in it. They argue that the bone gives flavor and posture to a stuffed ham. Anti-bone forces contend that with the bone removed, the ham is easier to slice and ‘you can fill up the bone-hole with more stuffing.’”
Almost lyrical.
Stuffed Ham Recipes, Southern Heritage Cookbook Library
As I labored away at the incisions, I thought of the point of the blog itself… oftentimes I simply want to taste food that I wouldn’t otherwise. Hearth cooks like Michael Twitty perform their cooking processes as a way of channeling lost voices of the past. Is it possible to channel the living?
I do know that every time I make the ham I think of kindly Bertha Hunt and her connection with her mother… the rightful pride imbued in this labor-intensive tradition. My own mother taught me the basics of carpentry, and even as I acquire new skills I am building on what I learned from her.
While engaged in the act of cooking other peoples’ recipes, I often imagine the ways in which a more experienced person would handle the process. Perhaps a stuffed ham pro would maneuver the ham expertly, making swift cuts in all the right places. I think about this as I wrangle and struggle with this ridiculous big piece of meat.
Is stuffed ham in any danger of extinction? Perhaps not. But it could be in danger of homogenization, as the home-ham-makers wane, and customers seek out the most “authentic” of hams. In a fascinating article in the Guardian about the British obsession with sandwiches, author Sam Knight interviewed an employee of a large sandwich producer:
“Twenty thousand people a day used to make a ham and cheese sandwich,” said Patrick Crease, a product development manager. “Now this is their ham and cheese sandwich.” I don’t know whether he meant to, but he made this sound somehow profound and irreversible. “There are 20,000 variants that don’t exist anymore.”
I ended this year’s ham-making not by swearing it off but by swearing to make it again, with my excessive red pepper, whatever greens the farmer’s market has to offer, and unskilled hands. Next year I plan to drag some family in on the act.
It may not be authentic, but it is mine.
Recipe:
- 1 fresh ham 7-10 lbs
- curing salt I used Prague Powder #1
- brown sugar or molasses + white sugar
- regular salt
- 3 lbs assorted greens: cabbage, mustard, turnip, chard, kale, cress, spinach
- several stalks celery, chopped
- 2 bunches green onions, chopped
- black pepper to taste
- 1 teaspoon celery seed or to taste
- dried red pepper to taste
Take enough water to cover your ham in its vessel and heat the water with a ton of salt & curing salt, plus maybe ½ cup of brown sugar, or white sugar + a little molasses, peppercorns if you want. Basically just search the internet and figure out how much salt you need to keep the ham safe. Maybe ask a butcher or something.
Also ask them if you should remove the tough skin before or after brining. When they tell you, email me please.
If you manage to brine the ham for a month then you should probably soak it in some fresh water before using… old recipes do this a lot. Since mine went for a week and then I cut off the outside I didn’t bother.
Clean up all your greens and roughly chop, then blanch them in salted water in batches, drying VERY well. Process the greens and celery in food processor until chopped.
Grind pepper and red peppers (I used about…. 12 hot pepper pods). Mix all seasonings with greens and green onions.
Cut slits to your preference. I’m officially on team “bone hole” personally. Like…. you could even boil the bone in the pot if you care about the flavor. Stuff the ham and place in a pillowcase or an old clean t-shirt, pat with all the remaining greens and tie it tight.
Boil for 15 minutes per pound (or until internal temp is over 160 degrees… let it go a little beyond that this isn’t some pork roast) then allow the ham to cool in the water before removing to slice and serve.
Recipe adapted from BGE Cookbook “Maryland Classics,” the Southern Heritage Cookbook Library’s “All Pork” and “Family Gatherings” & “300 Years of Black Cooking in St. Mary’s County”
