Baked Ham

One of my favorite Sunday meals has a baked ham center stage. My favorite cut is a shank portion. This is so easy you'll wonder why you don't fix a ham more often! There's plenty of fat to season the meat as it's cooking, but they seem to yield a lot more meaty slices. And leftovers? For breakfast you can chop up a slice or two for omelets or a ham and mushroom quiche. When lunch rolls around, you can fix a ham salad sandwich or just put a slice on a roll with a slice of Swiss cheese.

When the temperature cools off a little; I'll get Andy to smoke one of these on the Bubba Keg. That definitely puts a different spin on it! Smoked ham is quite the treat!

INGREDIENTS:

• 10 lb. Shank Portion Ham
• 12 oz. Diet Sun-drop (or Pepsi or Coke)

Drop the upper rack in your oven to allow ample baking room. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. The label says 325 degrees, but I know how my oven bakes and this is what works perfect for me every time.

Using long aluminum foil, take two pieces and join them to make one extra large piece to wrap your ham in. Lay them on top of each other and fold up about 1/4" where they join. Fold two additional times. Lay in a 9x13 baking dish.

Rinse off ham and don't forget to remove that plastic circle on the bottom. Place ham in the center of the dish. Pour one 12 oz. Diet Sun-drop (or substituted drink) over the top of the ham. Tightly wrap and seal up the ham. Place in oven. 

It takes 20-25 minutes per pound to properly bake a ham. The internal temperature should be 165 degrees. You know when the meat pulls off the bone, it's there.

The ham I baked was a 10 lb. ham. I set the timer on my oven for an hour and a half. When the timer went off, I dropped the temperature to 325 degrees and baked the ham for an additional two hours.

When it is finished cooking, take it out of the oven and let it sit untouched for a minimum of 15 minutes before you cut into it. Speaking of which, I'm fortunate Andy can slice a ham and make it look decent.