How to Purchase a Holiday Ham

Ham can take on myriad flavors, including honey, bourbon, pepper, apple and maple. No mere pork leg, ham is either wet-brined in a mix of salt, water and sugar or dry-cured with salt, herbs and sugar, then aged for several weeks and smoked. Dry-cured hams require 48 hours of soaking to remove the salt, hours of poaching, and finally baking.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

1. Tally up your guest list. A bone-in ham will provide three to four servings per pound, while a boneless ham will yield four to five. Factor in extra for leftovers; there's nothing like a honey-baked-ham sandwich or country-fried ham and eggs.
2. Order as far as three weeks in advance. Ask your butcher or grocer's meat department how to place an order for holiday ham.
3. Browse Web sites and gourmet catalogs, but factor in extra time and money for shipping. Savor a Honey Baked Ham (honeybaked. com), the Starbucks of the ham business. Presliced, these hams range from about $50 to $120. The Holiday Ham Company (holidayham.com), Williams-Sonoma (williams-sonoma.com), Neiman Marcus (neimanmarcus.com) and Harry and David (harryanddavid.com) all offer a variety of high-quality hams.

What to Look For:

• Flavored hams
• Number of servings
• Butcher or grocery store
• Web sites
• Catalogs

Tips & Warnings

• Premium hams have less water added to the meat to plump it up.
• To kill potentially harmful trichinosis, heat the inside of an uncooked ham to at least 155 degrees F (68 C).