Slow Cooked Spiced Ham

It might seem like a bit of an extravagance to buy a ham in January, but you can get an awful lot of eating out of a large ham like this eating it sliced, warm and cold, then stretching the rest into several meals using rice, pasta, quiche, bakes, pies and pasties.

Adding some spices and citrus fruit to the cooking liquid just adds a little extra flavour to the ham.  It's not overpowering and is more obvious in the cold ham than when it is served warm.

Slow Cooked Spiced Ham
1 ham or gammon joint (2.5 kilos)
1 cinnamon stick
2 star anise
3 all spice berries
1/2 lemon
1/2 orange
1 litre of liquid (you can use apple juice, cider, white wine or water or a combination)

Place all the ingredients in your Slow Cooker or Crockpot,  put on the lid and cook on low for 4-5 hours.

Farmersgirl Tips

• If you are using a smaller gammon joint, simply reduce the liquid, spices and cooking time, it's a really that simple.
• If you want to glaze your ham, remove the rind, then using a sharp knife, make a criss cross pattern in the fat.  Make a mixture of  50g dark brown sugar and 1 tsp dried mustard powder and rub into the fat.  Heat the oven to 180C and bake until the rind is bubbling about 10-12 minutes.  I would recommend lining your tin with foil as the sugar mixture is really sticky and difficult to remove.

• 

This is my entry for my #SlowCookedChallenge, the theme for January is CITRUS, why not join me?

Labels: all spice, bacon, Cinnamon, crockpot, Gammon, ham, lemon, orange, Slow Cooked Challenge, slow cooker, spice, star anise

posted by Janice @ 19:30 10 Comments

Ham in Ginger Beer - The May/June Slow Cooker Challenge

After relying on my Slow Cooker for three months, once I got my oven back, I rather neglected the Slow Cooker.  However, today I was getting my hair coloured and cut, plus doing a few bits of shopping in town, which meant I would be out from 10am until about 3.30pm.  This is when the Slow Cooker really comes into it's own.

Slow Cookers are brilliant for cooking gammon joints, the slow cooking makes the ham really tender and it's such a simple dish to make.


Slow Cooker Ham
750g-1.5kg ham or gammon joint
10 black peppercorns
1 tbsp honey
330ml Crabbies Alcoholic Ginger Beer, cider or apple juice
500ml boiling water

1. Place a piece of foil in the bottom of your slow cooker, this will help you lift the ham out when it is cooked.
2. Place the ham in the slow cooker and add the peppercorns.
3. Pour over the bottle of Crabbies Alcoholic Ginger Beer.
4. Mix the honey with the boiling water and pour over the ham.
5. Place the lid on the slow cooker and cook on Low for 8-10 hours or on HIGH for 5-6 hours.
6. When the cooking time is up, lift the ham from the cooker and drain before slicing.
7. Serve hot or cold. 

 I served the ham with boiled new potatoes, cauliflower and parsley sauce.  I added a little of the cooking liquor to the sauce which added a lovely sweetness with just a hint of ginger. We also had the ham cold with salad and the flavour of the Alcoholic Ginger Beer came through more strongly in the ham slices.  I managed to make it stretch to three meals for three adults, with reasonable portions, so really good value all round.



It's an OPEN themed challenge this month, so feel free to enter ANY recipe cooked in a Slow Cooker or Crockpot, just follow the rules below:

• Make your recipe in your Slow Cooker and post a photograph and the recipe, or a link to a recipe, on your blog
• Link to Farmersgirl Kitchen
• Use the Slow Cooker Challenge logo in your post
• If you use twitter, tweet your post with @FarmersgirlCook and #SlowCookerChallenge and I will re-tweet it to my followers AND post your post your pictures on a dedicated Pinterest board.

Rules:

• Please do not publish recipes from cookbooks on your blog without permission, they are copyright.
• If you are using recipes from another website, please link to the recipe on the website rather than publishing the recipe. 
• You can re post previous recipes on your blog, but please add the Slow Cooker Challenge Logo and link.
• One entry per blog.
• Recipes must be added to the linky by the 28th of each month.

As I will not be available to round up the challenge at the end of May, I am running this challenge over two months. The Challenge will end 28TH JUNE, 2014. 
 

Labels: Crabbies Alcoholic Ginger Beer, Gammon, ham, Slow Cooker Challenge

posted by Janice @ 20:51 7 Comments

Bacon or Ham Stewpot

The recipe states that you should remove the rind and cut up your ham into cubes, but as I wanted to use it for other things,  I cooked it, covered in water, for 20 minutes in the pressure cooker until it was just tender.  I kept the ham stock to make soup later.

6. Serve with a green vegetable.

As I wasn't using the cubed bacon but had the whole joint in the pot, so once it was cooked I took out the bacon joint, halved it and cut half into cubes then stirred them back into the vegetable mixture.


This makes a huge pot of delicious, filling and warming food, which would feed 6-8 people.  It would be ideal for a Halloween or Bonfire Party and, even better,  I still have half the ham which I'm making into a pie and will feature in another post soon!

Labels: bacon, Bookmarked Recipes, carrots, casserole, Gammon, ham, haricot beans, Le Creuset, potato, stewpot, Vegetables, vegetarian

posted by Janice @ 16:16 13 Comments

Gammon and Sweetcorn Pie

Another recipe from the Good Housekeeping 7 Fab Family meals for £33. The recipe on the website is for Gammon and Sweetcorn Parcels, but I decided it would be easier to make a big pie. The flavour of the leek with the parsley sauce, gammon and sweetcorn is really delicious. I used ready rolled shortcrust pastry because I didn't have time to make my own (lazy moo!).

Labels: Gammon, Good Housekeeping, Pie

posted by Janice @ 21:43 3 Comments

Gammon with Parsley Sauce

The All About You website is featuring Good Housekeeping's 7 Fab Family Meals for £33, this recipe is meant for Sunday, but I usually have a special dinner on Saturday and something a little more simple on a Sunday. I have to say the gammon was really delicious and it was only an ordinary joint from the supermarket, the mustard and honey glaze really made the difference and the parsley sauce was delicious.

Labels: Gammon, Good Housekeeping

posted by Janice @ 21:22 2 Comments