I do have to give it credit, though, for being an easy dish to make. I bought a pre-cooked spiral ham, so I just had to heat it up. The only challenge in that was that the directions were wildly inaccurate with respect to cooking time. The ham was barely warm when the appointed time of dinner arrived and the meal had to be delayed (it helped that some of my company was late arriving, mitigating my faux pas).
The only area of creativity where a pre-cooked ham is concerned is the glaze. Mine came with a plastic pouch of some type of honey glaze, but the list of ingredients was sketchy — too many chemical terms for my liking! And besides, I wanted to be in charge of flavour, thank you very much. So the packet went into the garbage and I looked at a few different ideas online to come up with an easy recipe for a maple syrup-based glaze.
Once the ham was finally hot and about 30 minutes from being ready, I brushed it with the following mixture: 1/4 cup maple syrup, 1/4 cup brown sugar, 2 tablespoons dijon mustard (whole grain preferably as I love the look and texture) and freshly ground black pepper to taste. Easy!
I enjoyed the painterly act of brushing on the glaze, ensuring the entire outside of the ham was evenly coated with its sticky sweet and spicy goodness. It gave the ham a great burnished colour and added an extra burst of flavour.
Brent took a few quick pictures while I was slicing the beast, but to be perfectly honest by that point I was in a rush to get everything on the table. I was being hampered by the bone (my advice: buy boneless!), which was not doing my general disposition any good, so setting up an attractive shot was not a priority. The best I can manage is one small picture that shows how attractive the glaze turned out.
It’s good to know that even with an ingredient as ‘pre-fab’ as a ham, it’s possible to add your own touch of flavour and flair for presentation.
