How to Salt Cure a Ham

Cure a ham yourself

Difficulty: Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• a pound of salt
• pepper
• brown suger

1. 
    

   You take that fresh ham, and rub it all over with salt (a pound for a ham this size), pepper, brown sugar, and saltpeter:

2. 
    

   After carefully packing the spice mixture around the bone, under the skin, and all over, you wrap in brown paper. I tied it with kitchen twine because I was doing it by myself and in the next step having the twine holding it together will be handy:

3. 
    

   Then you put it in a muslin sack. It’s important to keep it wrapped in the brown paper to keep the salt around the ham. That’s why I tied it up, so as I wrestled it into the sack the brown paper wouldn’t come undone. My mom gave me the sacks, they’re old clover seed sacks. You could make one out of a couple of kitchen towels if you’re short on clover seed sacks

4. 
    

   Then you hang it in a dry dark space until August. (Yes, this is November. It hangs for 9 months.) Hang it somewhere where the varmints won’t get it. This is hanging from a beam in my garage. It’ll drip (ewww) so don’t hang it over anything.

[vcarney]

on 12/1/2009 Not sure if I'd follow this article as is. First off, be sure to trim off the excess fat and "shape" the ham. Also, you need to open up the ham by the shank and stuff a bunch of cure down there to help prevent bone rot and spoilage. Another big thing, you want to hang the ham bone end down to help maintain the shape. Also, and this is very important: you only cure for 2.5 days per pound of meat, not 9 months. After those 3 to 4 weeks have passed, you take down the ham, scrape off all the mold and wipe it down with vinegar, then you can smoke it or simply rewrap it and rehang it for aging. A garage probably isn't the best place to hang your ham due to temperature variations and potential "car exhaust flavor" being imparted to your meat. Here's a good guide to help you get started salt curing: http://extension.missouri.edu/publications/DisplayPub.aspx?P=G2526

[funmom970]

on 11/29/2009 Great info. 5*

[tclough]

on 8/23/2009 Excellent job with this article. Thank you.

[lucindaroth]

on 5/9/2009 Sounds easy thank you!

[leaper]

on 5/2/2009 Great article on how to cure a ham.