Page:The English housekeeper, 6th.djvu/55

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THE LARDER.
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dered, and mixed with a small quantity of common salt; let it lie all night. Make the following pickle: a quart of stale strong beer, ½ lb. of bay salt, ½ lb. of common salt, and the same of brown sugar; boil this twenty minutes, then wipe the ham dry from the salt, and with a wooden ladle, pour the pickle, by degrees, and as hot as possible, over the ham; and as it cools, rub it well into every part. Rub and turn it every day, for a week; then hang it, a fortnight, in a wood-smoke chimney. When you take it down, sprinkle black pepper over the bone, and into the holes, to keep it safe from hoppers, and hang it up in a thick paper bag.

Another.

For one of 16 lb. weight. Rub the rind side of the ham with ¼ lb. of brown sugar, then rub it with 1 lb. of salt, and put it in the salting-pan, then rub a little of the sugar, and 1 oz. of saltpetre, and 1 oz. salt prunel, pounded, on the lean side, and press it down; in three days turn it and rub it well with the salt in the pan, then turn it in the pickle for three weeks; take it out, scrape it well, dry it with a clean cloth, rub it slightly with a little salt, and hang it up to dry.

Another.

Beat the ham well on the fleshy side with a rolling pin, then rub into it, on every part, 1 oz. of saltpetre, and let it lie one night. Then take a ½ pint of common salt, and a ¼ pint of bay salt, and 1 lb. of coarse sugar or treacle; mix these ingredients, and make them very hot in a stew-pan, and rub in well for an hour. Then take ½ a pint more of common salt and lay all over the ham, and let it lie on till it melts to brine; keep the ham in the pickle three weeks or a month, till you see it shrink. This is sufficient for a large ham.

Another, said to be equal to the Westphalian.

Rub a large fat ham well, with 2 oz. of pounded saltpetre, 1 oz. of bay salt, and a ¼ lb. of lump sugar: let it lie two days. Prepare a pickle as follows: boil in 2 quarts