Roasting meat is an old way of cooking.
Even if archaeologists and historians still argue about when the Russian oven actually appeared - in the middle of the last millennium or 2-3 millennia earlier, but roasting ham in the oven in foil very clearly resembles the culinary traditions of the old Russian cuisine.
Before the appearance of French cooks in Russia, and in peasant families, and at the royal court, meat was cooked in the old manner - cooked or baked with whole carcasses.
Very often the pigs carcasses were stuffed with other kinds of meat, baking them on hot coals, on a spit.
Approximately then it was noticed that the top of the meat burns, and in order to avoid this, they began to coat the carcasses for baking with clay, and a little later - with rye dough, which gave the dish a completely new taste.
So, roasting ham in the oven in foil is an old culinary processing of meat using modern technical capabilities.
Modern Russian cuisine has retained the original traditions, expanded the range of products and technologies of their culinary processing, adopting the experience of neighboring countries.
Ham in the oven in foil - the basic technological principles
Whole carcasses are rarely prepared now, and even a whole part of pork carcasses, but roasted meat is still popular with cooks and gourmets.
As a rule, ham in the oven in foil is associated with the preparation for a festive feast. This is also a tribute to the old Russian way of life. In the daily life of the peasants were mainly soups, cereals, flour products.
Cooking meat dishes often marked the end of the post. On the occasion of the upcoming holidays and a generous Russian feast in wealthier families, pigs or piglets were slaughtered; in poor families for the holiday tried to cook at least a chicken. Here the dishes did not differ by a special variety of ingredients: the meat was prepared in accordance with the old Russian culinary traditions and the dishes had a more natural taste.
Russian cuisine was significantly different in social characteristics. Ham in rich boyars and merchants' houses was baked in accordance with the best trends of that time. Domestic cooks were gradually supplanted by imported French, German, or Dutch culinary experts. They began to cook the meat, pre-cutting into portions, flavoring the dish with overseas vegetables and spices. The emergence of methods of heat treatment, added the traditional Russian technology: meat and other products are not just baked or cooked. Combined processing methods appeared: before baking, the meat was boiled or stewed in an oven, put into pots and covered with dough.
Modern Russian cuisine does not limit the way of cooking ham in the oven in foil: neither by the type of heat treatment, nor by the variety of additional ingredients used.
Perhaps, considering the basic technological principles, you should pay more attention to the choice of the main ingredient - pork ham.
The most preferred option is fresh, chilled meat. Appearance of the selected rear of the pork should have a delicate, pink color, preferably without blood stains and blotches. If the meat is saturated with blood, it must first be soaked, repeatedly replacing cold water.
When buying, pay attention to the condition of the skin if you are going to bake the meat along with the skin, which, by the way, gives the dish some additional benefits. The surface of the pork skin should be undamaged, thoroughly tarred, without bristles.
You can grind the stubble on your own, but such an operation is much easier to perform when the carcass is not cut into pieces and the juice from the meat does not flow out. When buying meat, be sure to smell it. The smell of tar skin should correspond to the smell of burned straw, not gasoline, which often happens when unscrupulous vendors, wanting to speed up and cheapen the process of preparing meat for sale, will grind the carcass with a blowtorch filled with gasoline.
Pay attention to the thickness of the subcutaneous fat. For the preparation of minced meat suitable fatty pieces of meat, but for baking the whole piece is better to choose meat with a very thin fat layer, especially if you do not like too fatty foods.
It is much more difficult to determine the age of a clogged carcass if it is cut into pieces. Here, basically, you have to rely only on the good faith of the seller. Unpleasant smell has the meat of sexually mature boars and females after mating. This quality criterion can also be established in an organoleptic manner.
Sanitary-epidemiological control over the quality of meat, as a rule, is carried out by specialized services available in each organized market, giving the seller permission to sell. Do not buy meat in natural markets, where there is a high probability of exposing health to danger. Baking with the use of foil is not difficult, but rather, on the contrary, it facilitates the cooking process. It is enough to know some subtleties of using foil for baking meat.
The foil serves as a kind of non-stick coating, protecting the product from sticking to the surface. At the same time, it keeps the temperature so that the meat is baked in deeper layers. The use of foil avoids the natural evaporation of the juice and flavor in the cooking process. In particular, this property of the foil helps in baking large pieces or even whole ham. In order for the finished dish to have a beautiful, crispy look, at the last stage of baking, the foil is removed and the meat is fried in the open form. For greater effect at the same time, the surface of the meat is smeared with mustard, honey or other mixtures, to form a rudder crust.
For roasting, only the pulp is often used, without bones, but it should be borne in mind that bone juice gives a more interesting taste: especially when cooking boiled pork or another dish that can be served cold. It must be remembered that in the tubular bones and pork skin contains collagen, the substance from which gelatin is obtained. This property can be useful in the preparation of cold appetizers of pork, baked in the oven.
If the ham in the oven is prepared in portions, pre-boiled or stewed, the foil is sometimes replaced with dough, which is covered with ceramic pots or other forms for baking, which gives the dish an interesting originality.
A variety of ingredients used to decorate the taste of ham in the oven in foil helps to avoid the repetition of taste. Combinations of pork with fruits and dried fruits, vegetables, other meats, and cereals are appropriate. To prepare a pork dish in the oven, honey, mustard, tomato, wine or wine vinegar sauces, citrus juices, and beer are used. Spices and herbs are a wide range for cooking pork gammon.
Preliminary preparation of meat for baking may also include different methods of mechanical processing: cutting, preparing lard, semi-finished products, stuffing, beating. The baking time depends on the size of the prepared piece, the technical capabilities of the oven and the preliminary processing of meat. Fresh ham, weighing 1-1.5 kg, baked for at least an hour at 180-200ºC.
Large pieces of ham for baking are previously kept in brine or marinade from 24 to 72 hours, reducing the exposure time for smaller pieces, according to their size.
Recipe 1. Ham in the oven in foil: baked ham on the bone
Ingredients:
The back (or shin, pork), on the bone 3.5-4 kg
Water (must cover meat)
Salt (for aqueous solution, 15%)
A mixture of black pepper, ground 100-120 g
Ground coriander 50 g
Dried garlic 70 g
Sodium Nitrite 80g
Cooking:
A whole piece of pork ham, with skin we check and clean the surface of the skin, carefully scraping the impurities with a knife.
The meat, along with skin and bone, is soaked in ice water until the blood is completely removed: the pork should have a delicate pink color. The water must be changed during the soaking process 2-3 times.
Dry the prepared meat before marinating.
Take a large saucepan to fit the whole ham with saline. Measure out the right amount of water to cover the meat by 3-5 cm.
Prepare a small amount of salt solution, preheating the water and dissolving the salt in it. The amount of salt - 150 g / 1l.
Pour the prepared solution into the pan with meat and water, then move it to a cool place for 48-72 hours.
Dry the salted meat, squeezing out slightly the remaining water.
Make a cut from one side to the bone. Expand the layer of meat, skin down, not completely removing the bone. From ground spices and sodium nitrite (it will help preserve the natural pink color of the meat), prepare the mixture and rub the flesh from the inside. Wrap the bone again with the pulp, aligning the incision line and securing it with clips.
Wrap the whole ham with foil, the shiny side inward. Foam suture should be located at the top so that the juice does not leak, and to be able to check the readiness of the ham. If the foil is thin, roll it in two layers.
Place the bag of meat on a baking sheet and send in a cold oven. It is necessary to bake meat at 180ºC, not less than four hours.
Recipe. Ham in the oven with Georgian spices
Product Set:
Honey 150g
Ham, pork (back part without bone, with skin) 2 kg
Adjika (spicy and very salty) 200 g
Mustard (dry powder) 3 tbsp. l
Preparation:
Soak the leg in water for at least two hours, then wipe dry with paper towels.
Liberally grease with adzhika, if the adjika is not hot enough and does not have a sharp salting, then add half a tablespoon of salt and red pepper (this is necessary for the marinade).
Oiled ham, not very tight, wrapped in foil and sent to the refrigerator for five hours.
After the time, put the pickled ham to be baked for 120 minutes in the oven at 200 ° C.
Remove the ready ham from the foil and coat with honey mixed with mustard powder. Reduce the oven degree by 170 - 180 ° C, baking until golden brown, slightly drying the juicy ham.
Recipe 3. Ham in the oven in foil with chanterelles
Ingredients:
Pork pulp (back) 3 kg
Brisket 500g
Salt, pepper mix
Onions, sweet 0.5 kg
Flour 70-100 g (for sauteing)
Chanterelles, fresh (or frozen) 1.5 kg
White mushrooms, dried
Cream (10-15%) 1.0 l
Dill, chopped 120 g
Garlic 50g
Sour cream 20% 250 g
Cooking:
Washed and soaked back of the pork fillet cut into cubes or large cubes, 3x3 cm.
Chop the loin into thin strips, white or shallot - into medium cubes.
Rinse the boiled chanterelles and fold them away, removing the water.
In a deep, refractory form (preferably ceramic or transparent, which can be served on the table), place the meat, between it pieces of loin, onion and garlic.
Season with spices, salt.
Cover the form with foil and set to bake until half cooked, placing the dish on the middle shelf or setting the bottom of the pan with salt.
After 40 minutes, remove the meat and put the mushrooms on top. Cover the form again and continue baking for another 15 minutes.
Prepare a creamy mixture of cream, dried mushrooms, chopped dill, golden wheat flour and sour cream and sour cream by combining all the products in a blender at low speed. Brew the mixture, until creamy thickness, with continuous stirring. Fill the meat with mushrooms with white sauce, but do not cover with foil anymore. Add the temperature at 20-25 ° C and bake the dish until golden brown.
Serve boiled potatoes with chopped dill, garlic and butter.
Recipe 4. Ham in the oven, stuffed with cookies
Product List:
Pork fillet (ham) 2 kg
Carrots 350 g
Beef liver 800 g
Onions, browned 450 g
Oil (for passaging)
Cheese, hard, grated 500 g
Cream, drinking 300 ml
Garlic, salt, spices
Cooking:
Prepare the pork ham by stripping the fillets from the films and removing the fat. Rectangular fillet cut into thin layers (1.5 cm), zigzag; unfold a layer of meat and discourage, paying special attention to the places of connection of the layers. It should turn out to be a rectangle, of equal thickness, plastic enough to wrap it in a roll.
Prepare the liver by removing the membrane and bile passages. Cut it into small pieces or thin slices, lightly roll in flour and simmer with grated carrots; combine with browned onions and smash the prepared liver with vegetables, using a blender, bringing to a puree state. Add garlic and cream. Pre-lay the meat on a silicone sheet.
Cover the prepared meat layer with liver pate, not reaching the edge by 5-6 cm. Fold the roll and carefully transfer it onto the foil. Wrap the roll with foil: the seam of the roll should remain at the bottom, leaving the seam of foil at the top. Place the roll on a baking sheet, bake about 50-70 minutes. Remove the roll for a few minutes and unfold the foil, sprinkle with a layer of grated cheese and bake, placing the mold for another 5-10 minutes in the oven.
Stuffed roll is served cold and hot, with garlic-peanut sauce and vegetable garnish.
Recipe 5. Ham in the oven in foil with prunes
Product Set:
Salt and pepper to taste
Ham (fillet) 1 kg
Spicy mustard 3 tbsp. l
Marinated rings, single large bulb onions
Sour cream 500 ml
Honey (liquid, buckwheat) 100 ml
Garlic 30-50 g
Prunes 300 g
Cooking:
Chop the garlic and half of the prunes in a pulp with a blender and mix with sour cream and mustard. Salt and pepper leg, make the necessary number of transverse cuts, a small groove.
Season with spices and place whole prunes in the notched grooves.
Having laid on the foil, pour the sour cream sauce.
Wrapped tightly in foil, leave to marinate in the fridge for at least 120 minutes.
After baking until done at 180 - 200 ° C.
10 - 15 minutes before the end of roasting, remove the ham from the oven. After freeing the ham from the foil, we smear it with honey, distribute the pickled onion rings, sprinkling it with the marinade, bake until golden and crisp.
Recipe 6. Smoked ham in the oven in a foil with apples
Ingredient list:
Carbonate, pork (smoked) 1.5 kg
Star anise (or anise), ground
White wine (dry) 300 ml
Pepper Mix
Apples, sweet and sour 0.5 kg (net)
Honey or molasses (for glazing)
Cooking:
Smoked pork chop cut into slices.
Cover the form with foil and lay the pieces of meat in a single layer.
Pour meat over wine and add ground spices.
Close the form tightly and leave it in the fridge for 3-4 hours.
After infusion, place the slices of apples on top of the meat, along with the skin and pour over the sweet honey syrup.
Bake for ten minutes, then remove the foil and brown the surface of the dish.
Transfer to a dish, decorated with greens, to give a complete look.
Recipe 7. Ham in the oven in foil with cheese and pineapples
Product Set:
Rear 3 kg
Pineapple, canned 1 can
Adjika, hot 200 g
Herb Blend
Honey
Lemon juice 50 ml
Cheese, hard 200 g
Preparation:
Mix adjika with herbs and lemon juice, brush ham, wrap in foil and leave for an hour.
Pineapples, chop the cheese into cubes and wrap the roll in a pickled ham, tightly tied with a thick cotton thread.
Wrap the roll in foil and bake at a temperature of 160 - 180 ° C until ready.
When the roll is ready, smear with honey and bake without foil for 10 - 15 minutes.
Ham in the oven in foil - tips and tricks
- When baking meat with a whole piece, after turning off the oven, do not immediately reach it to give it “rest”.
- If you do not know which spices are suitable for meat, use the classic options: pepper, garlic and bay leaf. The main thing - respect for the sense of proportion, so as not to muffle the aroma of the main product. To improve the taste and juiciness, add sugar or honey.
- It is convenient to use a thermometer for roasting meat. It will always help to determine the temperature inside the piece, if it is necessary to keep it whole, without cuts, before serving.
- Defrost the pork in the refrigerator, in a sealed container or film. Rapid defrost degrades meat quality.
