Who doesn’t love a classic Christmas Gammon? Whether you like yours with a traditional honey glaze or something a little more creative, a great gammon is always a huge hit around the lunch or dinner table. We teamed up with our friends over at Dargle Valley to bring you a guide on how to cook the Perfect Christmas Gammon.
Many people find the thought of cooking their Christmas gammon very intimidating, but there is no reason to be nervous! Gammon is one of the easiest meats to cook.
How to Roast a Gammon
Roasting a gammon in the oven is, in our opinion, the best way to cook one!
To calculate the cooking time, weigh your raw gammon and cook it at 180 degrees for 30 minutes per 450 grams and an additional 30 mins after this. If you are glazing the gammon use the extra 30 mins for the glazing time.
Next, place the gammon in a roasting dish large enough. It must not fit too snuggly as there must be room for the steam to go around it.
Once your gammon is in the dish you can get creative. Gammon goes well with most sweet things. Honey and mustard, orange and soya sauce, maple syrup, marmalade, apricot jam, cranberry juice, ginger ale, coke are just a few ideas!
Now is your chance to be inventive and mix a few things together. Don’t be shy to baste a fair amount of your chosen marinade over the gammon.
Finally, cover the roasting pan loosely with tin foil. You don’t want the tin foil tightly around the gammon as you want all the flavours from your baste to penetrate the gammon. The foil must form a sealed pocket. Make sure your oven has reached 180 degrees before you put the gammon in it.
How to Glaze a Gammon
Once the gammon is cooked remove it from the oven and let it cool enough just to handle. It is much easier to glaze a hot gammon than a cold one.
Peel off the thick skin making sure to leave the fat on. You might need a sharp knife to help you along.
Next, using the same sharp knife, score the fat in a criss-cross pattern. Don’t make the scored piece too small, at least 2cm by 2cm.
There are so many different exciting things you can use to glaze and decorate a gammon. We suggest making a basic mixture using a cup of apricot jam, a cup of brown sugar, a quarter of a cup of Coleman’s hot English mustard, and a teaspoon of dried ginger.
Mix this all together to form a thick paste and smear it all over the top and sides of the gammon. Pop the gammon back into the oven at 200 degrees for 20 minutes. Baste the gammon with the glaze that has melted off after 10 mins.
You can decorate your gammon with pineapples, cherries, apricots – whatever you fancy! We suggest putting these on after the glaze and before it goes in the oven as this will give your gammon a lovely caramelised look. If you feel the glaze has not caramelised enough after 20 mins just pop the grill on for a few minutes. Watch it carefully as it burns very quickly.
We recommend pairing your gammon with a spicy, wood-aged Shiraz or Syrah. We went for the Schultz Family Wines Pepper Street Solid Syrah for this one.
Make sure that you head over to Dargle Valley to order your gammon in time for the celebrations.
Enjoy the festive season everyone!