Ham cooked in cider then baked in honey and apple glaze...

The most important thing I've learned when cooking ham is to soak it in plain water long before doing anything with it. Once, some time ago, we bought cured ham and I didn't soak it... just cooked it straight away as it came... well, that was a HUGE mistake. It was so salty that we couldn't eat it, we couldn't add it to anything else either... it landed in the bin. I just HATE waisting food, but there was no other option here. It was like eating salt on its own. This time I've learned from the mistake and the ham was 'swimming' in the water for good 20 hours (the water was changed 4 times during that period). Those 20 hours were still not enough, as the centre of the ham is still a little bit too salty. Next time it will be minimum 24 hours. Back to the recipe - ham cooked in cider rather than only water (which turned out very nice) and sticky, little on the sweet side glaze. Hope you'll try this twist on a traditional Sunday dinner.

How to make it...
Ingredients:
- 2 kg cured ham, soaked in water for minimum 24 hours
- 2 l of dry cider
- parsley and thyme
- 10 pepper corns
- 2 onions, sliced in half
Glaze:
- 6 teaspoons Harty's hot apple & sage jelly, if you like it spicy add more (review of the jellies)
- 2 teaspoons honey
- 2 teaspoons apple sauce/marmalade
- cloves, about 20

Take your previously soaked ham, shape into a nice round and secure with a string. Place your ham in a big pot, immers completely in cider (if you have not enough cider add plain water, just to cover the ham completely). Add parsley and thyme, peppercorns and onions. Bring to the boil, turn down the heat just so it's still bubbling a little. Depending on the size of your ham - you have to simmer it for 1 h per each kg + 20 minutes. I've simmered mine for 2,5 hours.
Take your ham out of the pot and drain. Wait a little so it's cooled and you can handle it. Now gently remove the string and take off the skin, making sure that you leave as much fat on it as possible. With a sharp knife score the fat - don't go as deep as to the meat!

Mix all your glaze ingredients and rub it all into the fat and all around the ham. Stick in as many cloves in the fat as you want. Place the ham on a baking tray (it's a good idea to lay your baking dish with a silver foil, some glaze will slide down and might burn slightly, you don't want to scrub your dish for next 2 days, when it's laid with the foil you just throw the foil away!).
Preheat your oven to 180 C and bake the ham (fat side up) for 30 minutes. Turn the heat up to 200 C and bake for another 15 minutes (this last stage will make the fat go brown and crispy).
Take the ham out of the oven, wait for minimum 10 minutes before slicing it. Serve immediately for dinner or you can cool it off completely and it will be great on a sandwich.

Smacznego!