It’s interesting that ‘spam’ has come to occupy a somewhat-overlapping place.
So, like “baloney”. Are preserved meats inherently nonsensical?
I would say it’s pretty definitive. Gammon is basically cured (like bacon) but uncooked. Ham is the same joint, but cooked. It’s saltiness varies widely, and it can be bought smoked or unsmoked. Just like bacon. Ham can be cold or hot, but either way it’s cooked.
Note that Nigella’s recipe for slow-cooked ‘ham’, starts with a joint of gammon.
That and the fact they tend to be fat and bold.
And - by common repute - wear red trousers to match the face.
The traditional distinction between gammon and ham was that gammon was cured as part of a side of bacon, while ham was cured as a separate joint.
Nowadays, as said, the difference is that gammon is sold uncooked, whereas ham is cooked.
OK, but like many a definition, it has plentiful exceptions; you can buy cooked gammon on the rotisserie/hot counter of supermarkets that have one of those, and you can buy cold, cooked gammon in whole or sliced form, and you can buy a ‘ham joint’ that will require cooking at home.
Which is why I say, mostly, but somewhat loosely.
That is a good one!
Inherently untrustworthy, maybe?
This has got to depend on where you are. Or possibly on who you buy your meat from.
Even easier is Waffle House if there’s one near you. Two menu staples are city ham and eggs and country ham and eggs, the latter being more expensive. Like you said, it’s chewy – they give you a steak knife to use on it but not for the city ham.
Silly old sausage
Just hot-doggin’
Like a sonnet.
It has 14 lines, except when it doesn’t.
It has a set rhyme scheme, except when it doesn’t.
It is written in iambic pentameter, except when it isn’t.
I think most definitions have exceptions, but if they are good, they give you a sense of the thing.
That is interesting! (There must be plenty of dissertations on the way Commonwealth nations’ use of English has diverged over the decades.)
I join @thorny_locust in commending this. Outstanding!
Sounds like a reasonable explanation for the usage.
As a kid growing up in Pittsburgh, we always bought deli ham from a chain called Isaly’s. It was specifically chipped-chopped ham. My mom would heat it in some Isaly’s barbecue sauce and serve it on a bun. These were called barbecue ham sandwiches.
As an adult I was surprised to find out it was a local thing.
As a child, and as long as I lived with my dad, 5-pound canned hams were what we ate when we had ham for dinner. Dad would score the top diagonally, and then score it in the opposite direction. He put a whole clove into each intersection, covered the top with orange marmalade, and baked it in the oven until the marmalade was caramelised.
It wasn’t until I was on my own that I realised those canned hams were chopped and formed. Today I make actual bone-in hams (spiral cut), or a spiral-cut boneless ham section for smaller dinners.
Farther back then that, isn’t it? There is a reference in the Canterbury Tales to the “Dunmow Flitch,” where, in the village of Little Dunmow, they would give a flitch of bacon to any man on the day after his first wedding anniversary if he would swear that he and his wife had not argued with each other at all since their wedding; supposedly, it comes from the fact that such a claim was considered “all gammon.”
I like the little 1 pound chopped & formed cans for baking and pan frying when Spam is too salty. They’re usually $3-4 at Aldi or Walmart and have a really long shelf life. Best, you don’t have four pounds of problem after dinner.
That is great! Very believable.
The Dunmow Flitch trials still survive. In its contemporary version, unsuccessful claimants get a consolation prize of gammon.
I found this photo gallery posted to r/sousvide:
https://www.reddit.com/r/sousvide/comments/1h2jyzt/uk_gammon_joint_experiment/