Pineapple Lime Glazed Ham

Holidays are a bit unconventional in our family because my little brother is a VERY VERY VERY good chess player and he travels a lot to different tournaments with my mom. Since they were in Philadelphia over Easter we had to delay our Easter dinner. Trust me, this ham was well worth waiting for. It is so much better than a Honey Baked/Glazed ham, I don't think we will be able to go back. The entire family loved it and we all agreed that we would rather eat that any day.

We BARELY adapted the recipe at all from Real Mom Kitchen. She used 1/4 cup honey dijon mustard, and we used 2 Tbsp normal dijon mustard. We definitely felt like it was the perfect amount. The taste of the mustard was not prevalent but just enough and we felt that the honey dijon would have made the glaze unnecessarily sweet.

This wonderful recipe and picture are courtesy of Real Mom Kitchen and can be found at this site here: http://realmomkitchen.com/10777/pineapple-lime-glazed-ham/

Pineapple Lime Glazed Ham Adapted from Real Mom Kithcen

Servings 12

Nutritional Information OF GLAZE! per serving (calculated on MyFitnessPal.com): Calories 83, Carbs 20, Fat grams 0, Protein 0 (Full nutritional count will depend on what kind of ham you use) 

o    1 (9-10 pd) fully cooked bone in ham, butt or shank portion 

o    2 limes

o    8 thin slices of fresh ginger

o    2 cups pineapple juice

o    1 cup apricot preserves

o    2 Tbsp dijon mustard

1.      Bring your ham out of the refrigerator 30 minutes before you are going to cook it.

2.      Preheat your oven to 325 degrees. Oven the ham with the flat side down. Now using a paring knife, score a crosshatch pattern around the ham. Try to just pierce through the top layer. The cuts will expand with the cooking process.

3.      Line your roasting pan completely with foil. You will thank me later for this one. Place your roasting rack in your roasting pan. Place the ham on the roasting pan flat side down. Then pour some water into the bottom of the roasting pan, you want it about 1/4 inch deep.

4.      Place ham in the oven and bake at 325 degrees for 15 minutes per pound.

5.      While the ham bakes, prepare the glaze.

6.      Zest the limes and set zest aside.

7.      In a sauce pan, add the juice of the limes you just zested, along with the ginger slices and pineapple juice.

8.      Bring to a boil and boil for about 8-10 minutes until reduce to about 1-1/2 cups.

9.      Remove from the heat and remove the ginger slices. Then mix in the apricot preserves, dijon mustard, and reserved lime zest until well blended.

10.  Remove the ham from the oven. Increase the oven temperature to 425 degrees. If there is no water in the bottom of the pan, add more. Brush the entire ham with a coat of the glaze. Once the oven has reached the 425 degrees, return the ham to the oven and cook for 15 minutes.

11.  Remove the ham from the oven and baste with glaze again cook for 15 minutes. Baste the ham with the glaze 1 more time and cook for 15 more minutes. Slice ham and serve. if any glaze remains, you can microwave it until bubbly, about 30 seconds, and drizzle over the ham sliced if desired. (I highly recommend it) A 9-10 pound ham should serve 12.