How to Cook Ham – NYT Cooking

From shopping to carving, you’ll learn everything you need to know about preparing the holiday centerpiece.

Sam Sifton’s glazed holiday ham.Romulo Yanes for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Vivian Lui.

Published March 27, 2025Updated March 27, 2025

[This article was originally published on Dec. 14, 2015.]

Ham is an excellent centerpiece for any large gathering or holiday meal, whether it’s a prepared ham from the supermarket, a fresh ham from the butcher, or a country ham from the smokehouse. We’ll help you choose the right one to cook, show you how to prepare it, and teach you how to carve it properly.

• If you’re cooking a prepared ham, the most commonly eaten ham, you’ll need to order it three or four weeks before your meal, unless you decide to buy from your butcher or supermarket. Hams that you can order directly from a smokehouse will generally have been cured with more care and will have a deeper, smokier flavor.

• You’ll need a heavy roasting pan or two throwaway foil ones, stacked to withstand the ham’s weight. You may also want a rack, an oven-safe digital thermometer, and a pastry or paint brush to apply a glaze. A sharp chef’s knife is key to carving success.

• Determining how big a ham to buy is by no means a precise science. Appetites vary, and people will eat less at a buffet than at a dinner table. But we generally figure ¾ to 1 pound of bone-in ham per person, and perhaps half that of boneless ham. Country ham has beautiful flavor, but people will eat very little of it because of its intensity and saltiness.

This is the classic ham of holiday spreads, pink-hued on the interior, crusty and often sweet outside. It is easy to buy and fairly simple to prepare, and rewards the effort with a stunning centerpiece for any festive meal or gathering.

Karsten Moran for The New York Times

Cuts of City Ham

A prepared ham, also known as a city ham, is wet-cured, which is to say it has been submerged in or injected with a curing solution of sugar and salt, along with sodium nitrate, nitrites and other seasonings. It’s often smoked after it has been cured.

This is the ham you’ll most often find at the supermarket. Indeed, it’s the big, juicy hunk of meat many of us know best as ham.

These hams are sold bone-in and boneless. Boneless hams are incredibly easy to carve, but we believe that bone-in hams are generally more flavorful. (And ham bones are terrific starters for soups; here’s a recipe.)

You can buy a whole ham, which is pretty much most of the leg above the foot. It is a lot of meat.

Or you can buy a half ham, from either the top of the leg or the bottom. The top of a ham is the butt end — wide and rounded. The bottom is the shank end — wide at one end, and tapered at the other. Ham steaks are often taken from the very center of the ham.

You’ll find both butt and shank ends at the supermarket, and both cuts are fairly simple to prepare. They will easily serve a crowd and will provide leftovers for days after. These hams should be carved in the kitchen and served as slices on a platter.

Karsten Moran for The New York Times

Spiral-sliced hams are placed in a slicing machine that spins the ham around a blade to create thin slices of meat all the way down to the bone. They’re pretty good hams, and are extremely convenient for large gatherings and particularly for buffets, when guests must serve themselves.

Tips for Buying a City Ham

A supermarket ham can be a delicious ham, just as a supermarket steak can be a delicious steak. But it is worth examining the label to see its origins and, in particular, to learn how much water has been added to its weight. Finding a ham online, where smokehouses now congregate to sell their wares, is another option. (Here’s Julia Moskin walking The Times through the process of choosing a ham.)

Whether at a butcher or a supermarket, pay close attention to the packaging. The label may tell you that the meat comes with “natural juices” or “water.” “Ham with natural juices” means the meat has picked up weight during the curing process, as the salt brings water into the flesh. “Ham with water added” has probably been injected with brine; it has more water in it than a ham with natural juices. That is your standard supermarket ham. The companies that sell spiral-sliced hams generally spiral-slice “ham with natural juices.”

Ready-to-eat hams constitute the majority of hams you’ll generally find in the supermarket, save the fresh ones. They will be marked as such on their labels. They need no time in the oven to be served, although they taste better with a little preparation.

Ready-to-cook hams have only been partially cooked, and must be heated through to an internal temperature of 155 degrees or so before serving.

Karsten Moran for The New York Times

How to Prepare a City Ham

Whether ready-to-eat or ready-to-cook, you have a couple of choices when preparing this type of ham.

You could make a glaze for the exterior of the meat, which helps both create a crust for it and to add a sweet flavor to counteract the saltiness of the meat.

And if it’s not a spiral-sliced ham, you could score the ham, opening its skin to the heat of the oven, allowing some fat to render and some of the glaze to penetrate the ham. The New York Times supports the application of whole cloves to each diamond in the scoring pattern of a ham, but it is not a requirement. (Our scoring and glazing chapter has everything you need to know for both methods.)

Here is an excellent recipe for glazed holiday ham, with a sweet, slightly fiery and herbaceous crust.

A fresh ham takes a little more time and effort to prepare than a cured or smoked one. It requires starting with an uncooked and often quite large haunch of meat. But cooking one results in a delicious range of flavors and textures, from well-done white meat to beautiful pink for the medium-rare crowd, along with crispy fat and dark-meat bits from the shank.

Karsten Moran for The New York Times

Cuts of Fresh Ham

A fresh ham is just that: a primal cut of pork from the rear leg of the animal. You can buy a whole fresh ham, a butt or a shank, with the bone in or boneless. We recommend bone-in ham for its depth of flavor. Because it is not cured or otherwise prepared, it does not come spiral-cut; you’ll be left to carve it on your own. (We’ll show you how.)

To buy a fresh ham, simply ask your butcher. Extra points if the ham comes from a pig that was allowed to graze free from a pen and was not administered growth hormones. It will be fattier and more flavorful.

Karsten Moran for The New York Times

How to Cook a Fresh Ham

You’ve bought your fresh ham. You could brine it if you like, just as you might a turkey or a chicken, then cook it in a day or so.

To prepare the ham for cooking, you’ll want to score the skin down to the flesh of the ham, and season the whole thing well with salt and pepper, taking care to get the seasoning well down into the cracks of the skin. If you decide to apply a glaze, wait until after the meat has been in the oven for 20 minutes or so, and then reapply every hour until the meat is done. (All you need to know about both methods is in our scoring and glazing chapter.)

Here’s a delicious recipe for fresh ham with a maple-balsamic glaze.

How Long to Cook a Fresh Ham

1 (12- to 16-pound) bone-in whole ham: 22 to 26 minutes per pound at 325 degrees

1 (10- to 14-pound) boneless whole ham: 24 to 28 minutes per pound at 325 degrees

1 (5- to 8-pound) bone-in half ham: 35 to 40 minutes per pound at 325 degrees

A ham is delicious simply seasoned with salt and pepper, but scoring and glazing will ensure crackly skin and more complex flavor for both prepared and fresh hams. It’s an easy way to get a ham ready for a party.

How to Score and Glaze

Scoring a ham looks impressive, but it also allows the fat of the cut to render more easily, and allows the glaze to reach the surface of the meat.

1. Using a sharp knife, make parallel cuts across the surface of the ham, about a ¼ inch deep, 1 inch apart, then repeat in the opposite direction to create a diamond pattern.

2. If you’d like, insert a clove in each diamond for a fancy look and a punch of extra flavor.

3. Use a pastry brush to apply glaze to the ham, allowing it to get into the cuts made by the scoring, and repeat a few times after the ham goes into the oven.

Karsten Moran for The New York Times

Basic Glaze Recipe

Start with a base of a ½ cup of brown sugar, combined with a few tablespoons of honey, a tablespoon of good mustard and a splash of pineapple juice, then reduce it over low heat on the stove. (Or experiment: brown sugar and soy, say; or maple and mustard.) Use a pastry or paint brush to apply glaze to the ham during the final 45 minutes of cooking it, so it seizes to the meat but does not burn.

Country ham is as much an ingredient as a centerpiece: a salt-cured, air-dried (and sometimes smoked) haunch that can be sliced, pan-fried, baked or simmered. It is similar to prosciutto, and pairs beautifully with biscuits or on sandwiches, or sliced and fried and served with grits.

Karsten Moran for The New York Times

Buying a Country Ham

A country ham is dry-cured, which is to say it is rubbed with salt, sugar and other spices, then allowed to hang for many months, losing moisture and acquiring flavor. A country ham is often smoked in advance of hanging. It is dense and very salty, an American version of Italian prosciutto or Spanish serrano or Iberico ham. Many smokehouses offer their wares online now, which is your best bet when purchasing a whole country ham. (And remember: This whole ham will last you a long time.) Vacuum-packed slices are often found in Southern supermarkets.

Karsten Moran for The New York Times

Preparing a Country Ham

In some ways, this is the easiest of hams to prepare. There is no scoring and glazing needed. In fact, the curing and smoking process has done nearly all the work for you.

First, just stare at it for a while. Does it look a little moldy, a little covered with dust? That’s totally normal! Just wipe it off with a damp towel, then slice off some skin and then some meat and taste it. Salty! Wouldn’t that be great on a fresh biscuit? Do that, or soak the thing in water for 12 to 24 hours, changing the water three or four times, then cook in more water, at a lively simmer, for 20 minutes a pound. Take it out, dry it off, apply a glaze to it if you’d like and roast at 400 degrees for 15 or 20 minutes. Doing this adds moisture back to the ham, removing some of its chewiness. Carve it into very thin slices. (Our carving chapter has everything you need to know for that.)

Carving a ham looks like a tricky business. It is not. Make sure you have a sharp carving knife, and a suitable platter and condiments with which to serve the meat will make your meal that much more elegant.

Carving a Prepared or Fresh Ham

1. Cut one or two slices from the thinner side of the ham, parallel to the shank bone, in order to create a flat, steady base for carving on a cutting board.

2. Turn the ham so that it is resting on its base. Use a carving fork to hold the ham firmly, and make vertical slices into it, perpendicular to the bone, starting from the narrow, shank end, and moving toward the wider end.

3. Cut along the bone to release the slices and serve. Cut only as much as you need, as the leftovers will stay moist longer if left on the bone.

Carving a Country Ham

1. Trim the outer fat from the portion of the ham you want to carve.

2. Cut a piece off the bottom of the ham parallel to the bone to create a flat surface, and rest the ham on that side.

3. Use a carving fork to hold the ham firmly, and make very thin vertical slices into it, perpendicular to the bone, starting from the narrow shank end, and moving toward the wider end.

4. Cut along the bone to release the slices and serve. Cut only as much as you need, and then return the ham to the refrigerator until you want more.