Noche Buena is never complete without the traditional chinese Ham. I always choose Majestic Ham because it isn’t too salty for me. The secret to their moist, mouthwatering ham products is in their curing process. Their hams are cured in oak barrels, aged for full flavor, and seasoned with select spices before being cooked to perfection. It’s my preference, of course especially since they are so established with 70 years of curing and cooking ham to perfection under their belt.

The common glaze used is pineapple but this time, I used Apple-cinnamon glaze.

Here’s the recipe for Chinese Ham with Apple Cinnamon Glaze:

Ingredients
1 2 to 3 kilos Chinese Cooked Ham
2 cups Apple Juice
1/4 cup cherry brandy
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
1 medium apple , chopped
2 pieces bay leaf
1 tsp cinnamon powder
slices of green and red cherries
toasted cashew nuts
celery leaves

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Posted: December 25th, 2009 under Filipino Food, Noche Buena.
Comments: 4

Processed Ham these days are very expensive but you can surely prepare your very own Sweet Ham for Noche Buena. Here is a Sweet Ham recipe that has been tested many times in our kitchen. Though it is not free of preservatives, it uses very small doses of salitre. It tastes really good with the Pineapple Sauce, recipe is shown below the Sweet Ham preparation.

Ingredients

3 kilos (pigue or hita) pig’s leg without the bones; select one with the skin and fat intact
9 Tbsps sugar
8 tbsps salt
1-1/2 tsps msg or vetsin
2 tsps prague powder (instead of saltpeter or salitre) – In Manila, you can probably buy salitre at Chocolate Lover, a supplier of baking and cooking supplies

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Posted: November 29th, 2009 under Noche Buena, Pork, Recipes.
Comments: 6

Now that the two noche buena feasts are set aside, there’s a lot of extra food especially ham. In our case, we had a lot of Majestic Ham leftovers. The best thing to do is to recycle the leftover Christmas Ham for an even tastier dish. In fact, I got this idea from web searches on noche buena recycling.

Since we had a boned-in ham, we recycled the bone and ham bits by cooking Beef Pochero aka Cocido

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Posted: January 2nd, 2008 under Home Cooking Tips.
Comments: none