Our family didn't follow the strict Catholic rule of no meat on Fridays. Although we did make the effort on Good Friday and we would have fish for dinner. Since I left home I have been particularly vigilant and always avoided meat on Good Friday. Except this year. Our usual family Easter celebration is always a glazed ham for Easter Sunday lunch. This year we had to bring it forward a few days and have lunch on Friday. Michael was flying out to London Friday evening to visit friends so Sunday lunch became Friday lunch. I could have served fish but the rest of the family if given the choice would prefer ham to fish.
I buy a half leg for and by the time it is all gone we will have eaten enough ham to last us until Christmas, when we will have a glazed ham for Christmas Eve. Easter Sunday lunch and Christmas Eve dinner are always the same. Glazed ham served warm with a potato salad and a green salad.
GLAZED HAM
1/2 ham leg
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup orange marmalade
1/2 cup Grand Marnier
Preheat oven to 160 degrees.
Mix all ingredients together.
Remove skin from ham being careful to leave the layer of fat.
Score ham with a sharp knife through fat without cutting into meat. I use lines because I prefer the look. Most people score in a criss cross pattern creating a diamond shape which results in little pieces of crispy glaze. I like big long strips of crispy glaze.
I never use cloves because I hate biting into a clove unexpectedly but most people stud the ham with cloves.
Place ham in a baking dish lined with parchment paper. This makes cleaning up easier.
Paint ham with a third of the glaze.
Place ham in oven and bake for 20 minutes.
Remove from oven and paint a second coating of glaze over ham.
Bake again for 20 minutes.
Remove ham and paint with the remaining glaze.
Bake for 20 minutes. Turn oven off and let ham sit in oven until ready to serve.
If you start baking the ham two hours before you sit down to lunch it is the perfect temperature when you are ready to eat.
