Ham can be a real bargain meat.  I frequently see it for less than $2 a pound in my area.  Of course the “honey baked” style hams are more expensive.  But never fear, here is a great (and frugal) way to make any type of ham taste like a “honey baked” ham.

Homemade “Honey Baked” Ham

This is all you need for delicious ham!

Ingredients:

1 bottle of syrup
Apple Juice
Spiral Sliced Ham

Directions:

1. Remove ham from the net it came in-being careful to save the net. Remove plastic wrapping.

2.  If you got one of those “glaze” packets in your ham throw it away.  Or, if you can’t bear to do that (like me) use the spice & sugar mixture to make cinnamon rolls

You don't need this!

3. Wash the net. (who knows what it touched in the store!), then place ham back in the net and secure it tightly with a clean rubber band, zip tie, string. . . whatever works.

Tada!

***Now I know at this point some of you are saying “what the heck? What’s up with the net?”. Well, I’ll tell you. You are going to be picking up and flipping over this ham multiple times. That is a very messy (if not impossible) proposition for a steaming hot, partially cooked spiral cut ham that is half submerged in hot liquid. The slices will flop all over the place, things will drip and splatter, and that is IF you can get a grip on the dang thing to begin with! If you net it up again, the whole ham stays together and it flips like a breeze.***

4.  Put ham in your largest crockpot.  Don’t worry if it sticks out-we’ll get to that in a minute.

5.  Pour the entire bottle of syrup over the ham.  Yes-you heard me.

Ooey and gooey...

6.  Add an equal amount of apple juice.  I just filled the syrup bottle up with apple juice then poured that in too.  The liquid should come about half way up the ham.

Fill 'er up.

7.  Take tinfoil and tent it over the top of the crockpot to make a lid. (I told you we would get back to that.

Just use a couple of pieces and crimp it down well.

I like to add a couple of kitchen towels on top of that to really hold in the heat.

8.  Cook on low for 6-8 hours, turning the ham every hour to really get the apple/syrup mixture into the meat.

Can you imagine trying to flip this over without the net?

9.  Remove ham from crockpot and enjoy!

10.  Don’t throw away all that lovely juice. . . how about cooking some beans in it, or using it as the base for a lovely soup.  Mmmm.

Oooh, too good to throw out.

Variations:

Buy a non spiral ham and jab the heck out of it with an ice pick so the flavors can get in.

Instead of the fake “syrup” you can use real maple syrup or honey.  Of course those options are much more expensive.

Substitute orange juice or pineapple juice for the apple.

Kick the flavor up even more by using frozen juice concentrate and not adding any additional water.

Bake on low in the oven instead of using a crockpot.

Tagged as: ham

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