Rosemary and Pineapple Glazed Ham recipe is my grandmother’s recipe that was passed down to my mother and then to me. The only alteration in this recipe comes from none other than the Greedy Girl, Chantay Neil. Years ago I saw that she added fresh rosemary leaves to her pineapple glaze and decided to give it a go. I have never looked back. Rosemary and Pineapple Glazed Ham is absolutely delicious! If you don’t like rosemary, leave it out and follow all of the other steps here.
Boiling Ham:
Traditionally in my family we boil the ham first to not only tenderize the meat but to remove the excess salt. Cured hams are extremely salty and we find that boiling it first helps to reduce the salt significantly. To flavor the meat, the ham is boiled with whole cloves and allspice.
Making the glaze:
We use pre-cut pineapples to dress our holiday ham and reserve the liquid for the glaze. You can use freshly made pineapple juice and pulp for this but we choose the easy way out. I’m sure a fresh pineapple with fresh juice would make this truly delicious. In the glaze also goes mustard, sugar, maraschino cherry juice and of course rosemary leaves. It is cooked until it is thickened and reduced.
Scoring and cloves:
Once the ham has boiled, we remove the skin and score the ham so the glaze and cloves can get into the meat. Scoring the ham means using a very sharp knife to make cuts on the surface in a patterned way. In each cut, we place whole cloves to flavor the ham.
Dressing the ham:
The ham is dressed with cored pineapple slices and maraschino cherries in the center of each pineapple slice.
Glazing the ham:
The ham is glazed with the reduced pineapple syrup once before going into the oven and again midway the bake. The eternal rule is to scoop up that glaze from the baking pan and save it to pour over the slices during service.
Ingredients
- 1-7lb bone-in shoulder cut ham
- 1/4 cup whole allspice
- 1/2 cup whole cloves plus more for dressing ham
- 16 oz can pineapple slices (reserve the juice, which will be about 1 cup)
- 2 tbsp dijon mustard
- 1 cup brown sugar
- 2 sprigs fresh rosemary
- 2 tbsp maraschino cherry juice
- 6-8 maraschino cherries
Instructions
- In a large pot, place ham, water, cloves and allspice. Set to boil. (Boil ham in about 1 gallon of water. The amount of water will vary based on the size of the ham. Use just enough water but do not fully cover the ham with water. Boil for about 1 hour. The boiling time will also vary based on the size of the ham. You may need to boil the ham for a longer time depending on the size.)
- While the ham is boiling, make a glaze by combining the juice from the pineapples, the cherry juice, mustard, rosemary and brown sugar. Cook the glaze until it has thickened and reduced. Reserve the pineapple slices and cherries for dressing the ham.
- Once the ham is boiled, discard the water and place the ham in a foil lined roasting pan.
- Remove the skin of the ham. (Some people may like the skin and want to keep it on. Keep it on if that is your preference). Score the ham by cutting from the top to the bottom of the ham. Score in one direction and then score across each cut in the opposite direction forming what looks like uneven squares. Each cut should be 1/3 inch deep and about 1 inch apart. Place whole cloves in the corners of each square. This is an important step because whole cloves will add lots of flavor to the ham.
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
- Dress the ham with pineapple slices and maraschino cherries in the center of each pineapple slice. Secure the pineapples and cherries with toothpicks.
- Use half of the glaze to coat the ham. Drizzle the glaze into each of the scores. Be sure to coat the pineapples as well.
- Bake the ham uncovered for 30 mins. Remove it from the oven and use the remaining glaze to coat the ham a second time. Bake again for 10-12 minutes until the glaze is set and shiny. Save the glaze from the pan for service.
