Easter Ham Recipe

Ok. If you have been reading my posts for the last week, you would have seen recipes for various kosher for Passover items using matzoh. So why now am I posting a Ham recipe? I have been trying to make an effort to share Holiday and/or Seasonal specific recipes in a timely fashion to help others (and myself) get a jump on the season. And in an attempt to be far and balance at a time in our country where deeper and deeper line are being drawn, I figure this would be a gesture of unity and goodwill. I am by no means an expert on Easter Ham. This is simply how I cook ham and the fam finds it tasty. This recipe also works well with turkey ham for those who do not eat pork. I have also included a Vegan Option

Brian’s Easter Ham Recipe: Serves 4-6

Ingredients:

1 3-5 Lb pre-cooked Ham, or Turkey Ham

sauce/glaze

2-3 Oranges zested and juiced
2-3 Tablespoons Brown Sugar
1 cup of water
1 cup of chicken stock
2 Tablespoons of maple
10-15 whole peppercorns
1-2 tablespoons of french’s mustard
salt if needed

Note: this recipe can easily be doubled based on the size of your ham

Procedure:

Pre heat the oven to 325 degree, 163 celsius. Place ham on a roasting pan. Mix all of the sauce ingredients except the mustards. I find that mustard can burn when used in a glaze. Add the sauce mixture to the bottom of the pan with the ham. Place in oven can cook for about 12 minutes per pound or based on the the package instructions. Bast the ham every 10 minutes with the pan sauce. If the ham looks like it is drying out, you might want to bast it more often or cover it loosely with foil. After the ham is cook, take out of the pan. Deglaze the pan with a little water, and stir in the mustard with a whisk. Cook down at a simmer to a sauce/glaze consistency. Season the sauce with salt if needed, and a touch more maple with desired.

Slice and serve the sauce in a gravy boat on the side.

Vegan Option:

Replace the ham and use 4 packages of pressed firm tofu block, cut in half with a chris cross pattern. Replace the chicken stock for vegetable stock. Place in the tofu block in two pans. Mix up the sauce ingredients including the mustard and divide the sauce up evenly. Bake in a 350 degree oven. Flip after 15 minutes, and cook just until the tofu is firm and the sauce is mostly absorbed into the tofu.

Paczki pronounced “Poonch-key”, Day 2010

Update: Paczki Day 2011 Post:

Today is Fat Tuesday or Mardi Gras. In Michigan, it is Paczki Day. The day to celebrate and pig out on huge polish pastries before lent. Now I do not go for the lent thing being jewish, but any holiday that features a king sized doughnut, I am in. That is where Paczki (Poonch-key) day comes in. Paczki are polish large fried dough filled with a variety of preserves and fillings. There is lemon, custard, rose hip, plum, strawberry, raspberry and more. I am a traditionalist and go for the raspberry. (That being my tradition). Rose and plum are traditional.

There are currently 11 on our house. Emily will not be partaking this year so that means 4 paczkis a piece. Ranging from 400-600 per, we are talking about 2200 calories of yummy fried goodness a piece. No wonder it is called fat tuesday.

We got ours at copernicus deli. They sell out every year, and there can be a line, so get there quick.

Postscript: I like to heat up mine paczkis in the toaster oven for a few minutes. What happens ever year is that I can never figure out which flavor I am grabbing for. Is the red filling raspberry, strawberry, or rose? This year my raspberry ended up being a rose, which was good. I had one rose and one plum. When I went to my weights class tonight, I wished everyone a happy Paczki Day, but my instructor and a few others dismissed this holiday as an affront to their workout. Tough room I thought until a polish woman on the treadmill next to me whispered that she loves paczki day and had two.

Happy Paczki Day to all.

Sweet Potato Biscuit Recipe:Christmas Biscuits great with left over Christmas Ham

Here is a recipe for Sweet Potato Biscuits. (Note this is slightly different from the recipe provided in my Biscuit class)They go great with all of the leftover ham from Christmas dinner. After making all of the fuss for Christmas Eve dinner, all I do for the next day is make some biscuit and have leftovers. Theses biscuits were a huge crowd pleaser with the fam. They are one of those recipes that have the family wandering the kitchen and asking if there are any more, and then giving a puppy dog look to try and get you to make some more. The sweet potato makes them unique from the traditional buttermilk biscuit. I peeled and boiled the sweet potato, but I imagine that roasting them would provide a caramelized rich flavor. This recipe can be doubled and the biscuits freeze well, but trust me, there will not be leftovers.

Ingredients:

1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for kneading and shaping
2 tablespoons light-brown or white sugar
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
6 tablespoons chilled unsalted butter, cut into pieces, plus a few tablespoons melted butter to brush on top
1/2 cup sweet potato puree chilled, about one good sized peel sweet potato or yam
1/3 cup plus 3 tablespoons of buttermilk

Procedure:

Peel and boil one sweet potato until tender. Mash with a potato masher or a
fork into a smooth puree. Place in a container and let cool in the frigerator

In a food processor, combine the flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Pulse to mix. Add the cubed chilled butter and pulse until the the flour/butter mixture forms a fine meal.

pureed sweet potato

fine meal

Combine the flour/butter mixture, the sweet potato puree and the buttermilk. It will be a moist dough.

Place the dough out on a well floured surface.

Add some flour and knead a few times. Pat down and roll out to an inch thick.

With a 2-3 inch biscuit cutter, cut out the biscuits and place them on a parchment paper lined baking pan. Make sure you press the biscuit cutter down straight in one motion. Don’t twist the cutter because that will create a seal and prevent them from rising.

Brush with melted butter and Bake for 20-24 minutes in a preheated 425 degree oven. Brush again when they come out.

Serve with leftover Christmas Ham

Holiday Photos: Chrismikkah 2009

Here are a few picture from my Holiday season. I celebrate both Hanukkah and Christmas. I am jewish and my girlfriend celebrates Christmas.That means I have a Menorah and a tree in my house. I have become a fan of the whole holiday tree idea, and in recent years I have wanted to coop the idea for Hanukkah to be a “Hanukkah tree.” The idea is to decorate the tree with hanukkah ornaments and for the top, have a Menorah that lights up.

getting the tree

Goats at Jenny Farms Stand

Me in a Baby Goat