Gayle’s Galley

We blinked and March is gone!  Personally, I’m glad it’s gone with all that crazy weather.

A quick glance at the April calendar shows another very busy month.

It’s Launch Month or as non-sailors call it April. For our family, there are birthdays and Easter.

In preparations for Easter, I’ve pulled my recipes for our family dinner. This month, I’m sharing my favourite recipe for ham with an awesome ham glaze. Once again, the recipe comes from a terrific Canadian cook - Barbara Mayhew. Her blog “My Island Bistro Kitchen” has a ton of great recipes. I’ve tried different ham glazes.  This is by far the best. Enjoy!

Glaze for baked ham

• 2½ TBsp brown sugar

• ½ TBsp cornstarch

• ¼ cup orange juice

• 1 TBsp honey

• ¾ TBsp mustard

• 1 TBsp pineapple juice

• ¼ tsp ginger

Combine brown sugar and cornstarch together.

Add all remaining ingredients into a small saucepan. Stir in the brown sugar-cornstarch mixture. Bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring constantly until slightly thickened.

Brush very lightly over uncooked ham. About 50 minutes before ham is estimated to be baked, apply a thicker coat of the glaze to the ham, ensuring it penetrates into the diagonal cuts in the surface of the ham. About 25 minutes later, apply another coat of the glaze and return to oven to finish baking. Allow ham to rest for about 15 minutes before carving.

Cured Ham – bone in

Whole cloves

Root Bear 1 ½ cups

Baked Ham

For this baked glazed ham, I started out with a cured ham (bone in).  I scored the surface of the ham in a diamond pattern, cutting in between 1/8″ and 1/4″.  At the intersection of each diamond, I inserted a whole clove.

The oven was preheated to 325F and the large roaster was lined with tin foil to make clean up easier.  The ham was placed on the roaster’s wire rack.  I then poured 1 1/2 cups of root beer into the roaster, ensuring that the ham was not sitting in the root beer.

I brushed a very thin, light coating of the sweet and tasty glaze on the ham (recipe above).

The cover was placed on the roaster and the baking began as the steam from the root beer infused the ham with additional flavor as it baked.  About 50 minutes before I estimated the ham to be baked, I applied a thicker coating of the glaze, making sure it penetrated into the ham meat through the scored lines and I returned the ham to the oven to continue baking.  About 25 minutes later, I reapplied the glaze.  When the ham was cooked, I removed it from the oven and let it rest about 15 minutes before carving it.  This makes it much easier to carve clean slices that stay whole.

Happy Easter. Safe launch.

Gayle