hi and a big welcome to Steve's kitchen
today I'm going to be showing you how to
make a ham specifically a Christmas ham
in this instance but we're going to be
taking a good cut of pork here I've got
a 6 kilo lot this is a whole leg of pork
now we've been lucky enough in the past
we've actually raised our own pigs and
brought them from them from pigs pig
lips up to the full ham but now we're
living in the city like a lot of you you
want to get a good bit of pork from the
butchers and then I'm going to show you
how to take it from the pork
so I've got a pot here with four liters
of water in now we need six liters of
water in total but I'm going to just
make the brine up with four liters and
then at the end I'm going to be adding
two extra liters to help call the brine
down and I'm going to add to that two
kilos of non-iodized salt now it's on a
stove top we're warming up the water
because it'll make it easier to dissolve
the salt and the ingredients that I'm
putting in so in go the two kilos of
salt we want to bring that up to a
little simmer let the salt dissolve now
I'm doing a plain water cure here but in
the past we've experimented with all
sorts of things you can add cider into
here you can add beers and ales stouts
almost any liquid can go into this and
get different flavors for your for your
pork but for this instance I'm doing a
plain brine and I'm going to add some
spices into this as well as salt I'm
going to be adding half a kilo of dark
brown sugar into this it'll add a
sweetness to the meat I'm adding 30 or
40 juniper berries juniper berries
actually add a lovely flavour around
Christmastime
about 40 or so crushed black peppercorns
goes into the mix as well I'm also
adding in some dried bay leaves now
because I have it in my garden I'm going
to put some leaves of sage in there and
I'm also going to pop some time I'm
taking fresh thyme and just dropping
that just pulling it off the stalks
spray it into the mix now you can be as
creative as you like with the spices and
flavors you put into your brine whatever
takes your fancy ready you can add
chillies in there as I said before all
sorts of different alcohols are often
used to add different flavors and and
color into the ham now we need to bring
this up to a simmer to let all the
solids dissolve the sugar and the salt
now this is optional guys I'm going to
be putting 30 grams that's about an
ounce of saltpeter into my brine now you
can choose not to use saltpeter but I
like to use it it keeps the meat pink
and you can do your own research maybe
on my website on my forum later on are
but a little discussion up about
saltpeter and you can you can decide
yourself
now saltpeter by the way is a naturally
occurring Minh
and you can usually get it at a chemist
but maybe you might have to go online in
parts of the Mediterranean saltpeter
occurs naturally in the seawater and I
think that's probably where they found
or discovered that that particular
mineral kept the meat from going a gray
color as it was being cured now I don't
want to get into a debate really where
the saltpeter is good some people say
it's not good for you some people you
decide for yourself you don't have to
use it in this recipe but I'm using it
and yes I fully understand about
nitrites and nitrates I've actually done
a lot of research and I've actually
written a book in the past about home
curing so I know a lot about saltpeter
and I'm comfortable using it guys now
I've brought my brine up to the boil and
little simmer as it is now and I'm just
going to let that simmer for about five
minutes you can already start to see
that there aren't so many sugar and salt
solids on the bottom it's almost ready
so when you're happy that you're solids
your salt has dissolved into the brine
we're gonna turn off the heat let it
cool down a little bit and then I'm
going to transfer this over to my
brining box so what is a brining box
well to me it is just a Tupperware box
this is a 15 liter box it's big enough
to take my entire leg in here it's not
too big so that will take up too much
liquid and we'd have to increase our
quantities of liquid but I say 15 liters
it's also got a cover that goes over the
top of it now it's important that you
don't use a metal container for brining
the meek the brine will react with
metals so use a plastic container or a
safe container that won't react with the
brine so into the box I'm going to put
two ice-cold liters of water so one and
two then I'm going to take my hot brine
and I'm just going to pour it in to the
cold water now at that point you will
still find quite a lot of solids in the
bottom of the saucepan but we've added
another two liters of water here now so
they'll start to dissolve now we have to
let this completely cool down we can't
be putting our ham into this hot water
we've got to bring it down to three or
four degrees Celsius that's about 37 to
40 degrees Fahrenheit now a little test
to make sure that you've actually got
the right salination a potato should
comfortably float in that water like
that although realistically if you
follow the procedure correctly you
shouldn't need to test it with a potato
that's just a bit of fun now other ways
you could call this down would be to but
ice in there instead of the extra 2
litres of water you could put 2 litres
of ice in there works um I'm gonna leave
this for a couple of hours to come down
to a temperature that's manageable for
the fridge and for me this will actually
fit in my fridge and I'm going to leave
it in there until the temperature comes
right the way down
now I've allowed my Brian to completely
cool down I've actually refrigerated
this overnight and the Brian is lovely
and cold now it's ready for the meet so
we want to take our joint and we're
going to drop it into the brine and if
we've done our measurements correctly it
will fully fill the box that we've got
here now it's a good idea to try and
weigh the meat down so it pushes it down
into the brine I sometimes use a little
ramekin like this and then when the lid
goes on that will push it down but you
do have to then take it out and maybe
turn it every day or so okay guys this
is going to go into the fridge now for
seven days I'm working that out at 1 day
per kilo plus an extra because this is
on the bone now we're not actually
curing this to air-dry this is going to
be roasted so I'm not too worried about
fully curing it you can calculate for
yourself how long you or piece of ham
has to go in so join me a little closer
to Christmas and I'll show you how to
roast this up to a beautiful honey roast
ham it's going to be absolutely
delicious
beautifully pink and crumbly just like
an old-fashioned ham thanks for watching
guys subscribe stay in touch comments
down below I'll see you for Christmas
guys thank you for watching I hope
you've enjoyed it it's been a lot of fun
I do have a passion for home cured meats
and sausage making and hams and the like
I'll put a couple of other links here to
some of my earlier videos they are the
pigs by the way in the background that
pigs my pigs that I used to keep and
yeah I'll see you very shortly in that
video to make this Christmas happen be
good see you there a couple of Cornish
Pasties anyway now the other day we made
some short cuts pastry so you know how
to make that but I'm going to make it
again here just to show you how quick
and easy