Spicy Curried Ham - Homemade Cold-cut Recipes - How to Make Pressed Ham
Author: Whats4Chow
Recipe type: Curing Meats
Serves: 1 Kg
Some time ago I featured a stainless steel ham press. Today we're going to use the same press to make a spicy curried ham. There is a link to the ham press in the description below.
Ingredients
- 1Kg Pork should (skin and fat trimmed)
- 4g Prague powder
- 15ml Salt
- 7.5ml Gelatin
- 5ml Chilli powder
- 5ml Sugar
- 2.5ml Garlic powder
- 2.5ml Lemon pepper
- 30ml Garam masala spice blend
- 100ml Chilled water
Instructions
- To start, cut 1kg of pork shoulder into large cubes. I have already trimmed all of skin and excess fat from this meat.
- Spread the cubes out over a large baking pan and put this in the freezer to firm up for 30 minutes.
- This really does help the grinder to mince the meat, while keeping a good texture.
- Once the meat is almost frozen, run it through your grinder using an 8 or 10mm plate.
- Transfer the meat to your mixer bowl and add 4g of Prague powder, 15ml of salt, 7.5ml powdered gelatin, 5ml chilli powder, 5ml sugar, 2.5ml garlic powder, 2.5ml lemon pepper and 30ml of garam masala spice blend.
- Finally, pour in 100ml of water.
- Fit the kneading hook to your mixer, close the machine and knead the meat mixture for 8 to 10 minutes until it is well emulsified.
- For the first few minutes the meat will tend to climb the sides of the bowl. Simply stop the machine, scrape it down and then continue. As the meat becomes more emulsified it will start to behave and scrape downs will not be necessary.
- Open the ham press and remove the spring-loaded pressure plate.
- Transfer the meat mixture to the press, makking sure to compress it after each addition to avoid trapping air in the meat.
- Stop adding meat when it reaches an inch below the rim of the pot.
- Follow this with the pressure plate, and then close the lid of the press.
- Place the press in your refrigerator for a full 48 hours to cure.
- After 48 hours, heat a half-filled pot of water to 76c or 169f.
- This is achieved using either a pot on an induction range, or a digital pot like this one.
- In addition, the water level in the pot shoul not be deeper than the level of the meat in the ham press.
- Remove the press from the refrigerator, insert a probe thermometer through the hole in the lid of the press, and place the press into the water bath.
- The ham must cook in the bath until the internal temperature reaches 72c or 162f. This will take about 2 hours.
- Once this has been achieved, remove the press from the water bath and quick-chill the ham in a bowl of iced water.
- One completely cooled, remove the press from the bowl and turn the ham out from the press.
- You can hand slice the ham, but using an electric meat slicer does the job brilliantly, especially if you want nice thin and even slices.
- And there we have it, a mountain of aromatic, spicy ham just ready for your table.