pat's Recipe

Baked Bourbon-Glazed Ham

Category: Pork

Ingredients
1 12-14 lb. smoked ham, processed, precooked variety
3/4 C. bourbon whiskey
2 C. dark brown sugar
1 Tbs. dry mustard
1/4 C. whole cloves
2 navel oranges, peeled and sectioned

Directions
Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Place ham fat side up on a rack set in a shallow roasting pan large enough to hold the ham comfortably. Bake in the middle of oven, without basting, for 2 hours, or until the meat can be easily pierced with a fork. For greater cooking certainty, insert a meat thermometer in fleshiest part of ham before baking it. It should register between 130-140 degrees when ham is done.

When ham is cool enough to handle comfortably, cut away rind with a large, sharp knife. Then score ham by cutting deeply through fat until you reach meat, making incisions 1/2" apart lengthwise and crosswise. Return ham to rack in the pan and raise temperature to 450 degrees. With a pastry brush, paint ham on all sides with 1/2 C. of whiskey.

Combine sugar and mustard and 1/4 C. of whiskey, and pat mixture firmly into scored fat. Stud the fat at intersections or in center of each diamond with a whole clove, and arrange orange sections as decoratively as you can on top of ham with toothpicks or small skewers to secure them. Baste lightly with drippings on bottom of pan and bake ham undisturbed in hot oven for 15-20 minutes, or until sugar has melted and formed a brilliant glaze.



Substitutions: 1/4-1/2 tsp. ground cloves may be used in place of whole cloves, added to brown sugar mixture. Also, pineapple slices and marashino cherries may be used in place of orange slices.

Yield: 12-14 servings