Soaking the Christmas Ham

First, a quick note: I've had a few requests for photos to accompany my food-themed rantings. I totally understand (there's nothing I like better than drooling over pictures of other peoples' cooking), but I'm faced with a slight impediment in the form of a digital camera. The Christmas present haul may remedy the situation, you never know. Otherwise, unless any of you want to provide me with some state-of-the-art photographic equipment,  the photo element of the blog will have to remain in the Research and Development phase for a little longer. Rest assured that I'm working on it.

And now, on to...

The Christmas Ham, Part One

Today was the first stage of a two-day marathon - the preparation of the Christmas Ham. This has become a tradition in my family since I was small, and a very pleasing development over the last couple of years is that nowadays the Ham (it definitely merits a capitalisation, by the way) is my job. Soaking a Ham may seem a rather tenuous subject for a whole day's worth of blog, but it's a vital part of my Christmas and so, in my opinion, merits a bit of a spotlight.

Besides, I was too busy decorating the Christmas tree to do much cooking.

Incidentally, we don't actually eat the Ham on Christmas Day - that's reserved for turkey, often at one of my aunts' houses. After bouncing and squeaking my way through the latest River Cottage (I'm a Hugh fanatic; if you aren't, you should be) I'm inclining towards goose as my favoured Christmas Day roast - more moist and flavoursome than turkey, I think.

The Ham, however, will always be my unquestioned favourite on the festive food front. Although it's not the star of the Big Day, it fills in all those other foodie gaps in the Christmas menu: with hot roast potatoes, winter vegetables and Cumberland Sauce on Christmas Eve; a couple of slices with a salad as a supper to follow the excesses of the Christmas lunch; far, far better than cold turkey sandwiches on Boxing Day. If you're careful, it might even last until New Year.

I honey-roast my Christmas Hams, which gives them a delicious caramelised crust - but that's for tomorrow. Today is the first, and much less glamorous, stage of Ham preparation, the Soaking of the Ham. Because a raw Ham bought from the butcher is cured with salt to preserve it, you have to remove the salt before cooking it. The best way to do this is to soak it in cold water overnight, turning it over at some point and changing the water every so often when you have time. I don't have a dish large enough to cover the whole Ham with water without it overflowing, but if you do then you shouldn't need to turn it, just change the water.

And that's it. Whenever you get around to it the next day, drain your Ham, put it in a huge saucepan, cover with fresh water and a can of cider, and prepare for Day Two...