smude

Please can you help. Can you tell me if I am able to buy an UNSMOKED joint of ham here in OZ? When I ask at the butchers the reply that I receive is that I should buy a leg of pork

Dorothy

That's what unsmoked ham is! Ham is the smoked, cured leg of a pig.

Thydney

Smoking is a way of curing ham. You can salt cure pork to produce ham I'd do wet cure rather than dry cure. You've left it late for Christmas if thats what you wanted.
Have a look at River Cottage website http://www.rivercottage.net he tells you how to cure your own pork with or without the kipper taste

smude

Thanks Dorothy - you sound like the butcher

smude

No don't want for Christmas - just curious that whilst in the uk you could buy bacon or ham, smoked or unsmoked - here it seems that everything is smoked. Just wandered if you can buy anything unsmoked - if so what do I ask for. ....cured? Fancy a nice piece of unsmoked gammon.

Maybe my taste buds will have to adjust.....

Thydney

Honestly if you're going to do it you'll want a leg or I'd get a loin. You tend to get smoked stuff in hotter climates because it's drier than normal stuff so is less likely to spoil.

All ham/bacon is cured pork. Smoked is dried in a smoke house as opposed to dried with salt (like proscuitto ham) or in brine which is what we get mainly in the uk.

Pollyana

Theres some good threads on here about how/where you can get it - its especially a problem in Qld where its hard to get hold of any unsmoked ham/bacon. Do a search on unsmoked bacon and you should find some info.
Best solution Cresta57 and I have come up with is to look for joints of Pickled Pork - not every butcher does them, but its the closest you'll get up here at least.

Dorothy

Not a butcher, but I do like my food

spartacus

Pat. . . .PAT!

PAT!!!

cresta57

Just buy a leg of pickled pork, it's exactly the same taste as a joint of ham from the U.K. Here in Aus every ham seems to be smoked, so is the bacon for that matter. The annoying thing is that most of it's not traditional wood smoke it's just a flavouring additive that butchers add to the saline solution [brine] that the ham is cured with. I have come to accept the bacon as smoked but ham yuck My butcher now does me a nice leg of pickled pork, he also slices a kilo or so thinly so it can be fried as unsmoked bacon

Rossi

Just buy a gammon joint and do it in the slow cooker

carolinephillips

I normally do a gammon for Xmas eve, but can't find it here- everything is pre cooked. Thanks for the tip on pickled pork- is it really like the old bacon joints that you boil????

cresta57

Yes

smude

Apologies everyone should have carried out a search.....how stupied do I feel now that I have. Usually do but didn't think that anyone would be as desperate as me for good old unsmoked ham/bacon....... how wrong was I.

But thanks again to those that did reply.

Dorothy

Did you find your unsmoked ham, though?