Real Smithfield Ham

I’m glad I was born early enough to experience real Smithfield ham. It isn’t what it used to be.

The original statute specified that the hogs be peanut fed. In 1966, the Virginia Assembly removed the peanut-fed requirement from the official definition. Smithfield hams haven’t been nearly as good since.

Peanut-fed hogs yield a ham that is oily-rich, not lardy-rich. The fat is translucent, not white. The peanut finishing makes a huge difference in the hams, and I don’t have any idea why the Virginia Assembly was so stupid as to degrade the most famous product of its land in that way.

They’re still dry-salt cured, which removes so much moisture they’re flat and thin and the flavor concentrates down to an essence, almost like the reduction of stock to a syrupy consistency when making sauces. The salting and the smoking yield a meat that is dark red, not pink. And in a real peanut-fed ham the rim of fat is narrow and yellowishly translucent. There’s nothing else like it. In the days of real ocean liners, such ships as the France would stock Smithfield hams as the best ham in the world. That’s the world.

Oh, there are country hams and Virginia hams, all of which are intensely salty and rich, but the flavors aren’t right. They just don’t taste as good.

To cook a Smithfield ham, it must be scrubbed of the pepper coating (protects it from insects) and soaked two or three times to remove as much salt as possible. Then it must be simmered for 3 hours. Not 2 ½, not 2 ¾, but 3 full hours. I used to do it in a cast iron kettle that was oval and covered two units of the stove. I couldn’t even lift the thing now if I still had it. I do have a huge graniteware casserole that might take it. I wish I still had occasion to cook a whole Smithfield ham. After simmering, the ham is cooled, the skin removed, and the fat scored in a diamond pattern. A whole clove should be inserted into the center of each diamond of fat. This mimics a pineapple, the traditional symbol of hospitality in the old South. The whole thing, cloves and all, is then glazed with brown sugar softened with a little pineapple juice. Then it must be baked for another hour. That sets the glaze and lets the clove flavor permeate the ham.

The ham is served sliced paper thin, frequently on biscuits. It isn’t usually a main-course kind of thing but an appetizer or party dish. It can be used as a second meat at Thanksgiving meals and a Smithfield ham sandwich is downright decadent.

The “essence of ham” flavor of the meat combined with the salt-sweet combination of the curing and the glazing yields a rich, luxuriant, almost impossibly wondrous flavor. I’m very sorry that those born too late may never have the full experience of a peanut fed ham, but maybe having known it and being unable to repeat it is worse. I really miss real Smithfield ham.

Bon Cuisine

(c) 2008 Katherine DeWitt