30 Before 30: Make a ham

You may be getting tired of them so let me start by saying that this will be my last food-related post for a while, I promise! Also, just so you’re not disappointed later, there won’t be any pictures in this post either. Hams are not particularly appetizing to look at, in my opinion. Sorry, friends.

I have a lot of funny/random thoughts on this topic which are better suited for a bullet point list than paragraphs. Let’s see how it goes.

• Pete and I were grocery shopping one day when I saw hams on sale. I decided to buy one to force myself to make it before my birthday. The smallest one we could find was close to 10 pounds.
• 10 pounds is a lot of ham.
• I was nervous to invite too many people over to eat it though since I didn’t want to screw it up.
• I convinced 2 people to come with the promise that we would get pizza if it turned out terribly.
• One of the other two people asked me why I wanted to make a ham and if I even liked it that much.
• The answer to the first question is that one day (when I don’t live in a 2 bedroom condo – my family alone regularly has 25+ people for anything we do) I would like to host family gatherings. Ham seemed like an easier place to start than turkey.
• The answer to the second question is no. Though, when I eat it, I’m reminded that salty meat is actually a very good thing.
• Interestingly, following my last post, I wouldn’t even eat American ham until I went to Spain and was confronted with jamon serano. Cured meat which sits on the counter and is eaten over a very long period. Yuck. Since I refused to eat that (and mayo on my veggies and seafood when I could), the dad of my host family took to calling me a crazy American. I didn’t have any energy left to refuse American ham  too.
• The  day I was set to make the ham (and have people over) Pete discovered one of the pipes to our kitchen sink was leaking. Awesome.
• The good news is, this meant my Mom and Tony would also be coming over to fix it . And eat ham.
• The bad news is, it is not easy to have people over when your kitchen sink is not working.
• Back to the ham, I found out the night before that hams are generally purchased cooked and all you have to do is re-heat them. Amazing.
• I found out the day I made the ham that it took much longer than the instructions said.
• Luckily, our friends were rather patient and the ham was actually very good once it was ready.
• Even with 6 people eating it and taking leftovers, we still had enough for split pea soup a couple of days later.
• I apparently do not like split pea soup. I kept thinking the onions were little pieces of fat and freaked myself out. Gross.
• We still have ham leftover in our freezer. The plan is to make a ham and cheddar casserole. I expect that will go better than the split pea soup.
• The end!

Tags: 30 Before 30, Food