Every time we cook a ham I end up wondering why we don't do it more often. It's certainly easy enough because it rather cooks itself and there's nothing that smells better than a ham in the oven. Leftovers are more than welcome spending a bit of time in the refrigerator too, although they never seem to last long in this household. It's just so darn versatile!
Last night's effort may be around for a while because we cooked a 9 pound butt portion Cook's brand that ended up being a wonderful moist and tender blend of spicy, salty and sweet with an incredible color and absolutely divine glaze. Not much could be easier than mixing a jar of seedless blackberry preserves with some prepared Dijon mustard and a touch of apple cider - pretty simple right? Basted on the ham every 20 minutes as it cooked, it came out of the oven looking like a shiny ruby coated gem and boy is it good.
Sliced up and served with our favorite gratin potatoes and a sweet mustard sauce we decided it's about the best meat buy for the buck you can find on the market right now. It'll provide lots and lots of holiday pleasure over the next week or so in some form or another - just you wait and see!
By the way, I found the recipe online at Cooking Light via myrecipes.com, so hit the link and it'll take you right on over to the original; however, although the ingredients remained the same I've changed the method a tad to suit our monster sized ham. Oh, and don't forget to line your pan with aluminum foil before you put the ham into it to make clean up easier. Needless to say I missed that step and that's why I'm reminding you. Talk about dishpan hands and that's just the Big Guy's!
Blackberry Mustard Glazed Ham (adapted from myrecipes.com)
1 – 9 pound butt portion ham, bone in (I used Cook’s brand)
Cooking spray
1-1/4 cups seedless blackberry preserves
3/4 cup prepared Dijon Mustard
1/2 cup apple juice or cider
Preheat oven to 350. Line a baking pan with aluminum foil and spray well with cooking spray (makes clean up a lot easier). Score outside of ham in diamond shapes and place ham cut side down into pan. In a small saucepan, combine together blackberry preserves, mustard and apple juice. Cook stirring constantly until jam preserves have melted and mixture is smooth. Brush ham with approximately 1/4 cup of mixture and place into preheated oven. Cook ham for 15 minutes per pound, basting with 1/4 cup of glaze mixture every 20 minutes, or until ham reaches internal temperature of 140. Remove from oven and coat with remaining glaze. Allow ham to rest a minimum of 20 minutes before serving.
A year ago - Lamb Burger with Minty Garlic Cucumber Sauce
That looks so good - and right now my mind is on what to have for Christmas...... hmmmmm you give me ideas = we all love blackberries......
Posted by: Lea | 12/21/2011 at 06:34 AM
What a beautiful piece of meat. We always use current jelly, but blackberry sounds even better.
Posted by: Lorraine | 12/21/2011 at 07:27 AM
Looks AND smells like a wonderful Holiday meal June! As always, I love visiting your site and never post anything without thinking of you. MERRY CHRISTMAS to both you & Big Guy!
Posted by: Mary from Apron Strings & Wedding Rings | 12/21/2011 at 07:48 AM
Lea - so great to see you're back from your vacation! Hope you had a fabulous trip. The blackberry/Dijon combination would be a great glaze on just about anything including a pork loin roast or even chicken...as long as you don't mind eating purple chicken!
Lorraine - guess you can tell we love trying new things and honestly, we were bowled over with this one. It's really, really good!
Mary - and Merry Christmas to you too.
Posted by: June | 12/21/2011 at 02:00 PM