Mutton Ham

When we had Leda, a 2 1/2 year old ewe, butchered last fall I asked the butcher to smoke two hams. They were bigger than I anticipated and I was waiting for a special occasion to serve one. Yesterday, Valentine's Day, was my husband's birthday and he had been wanting to try the mutton ham. We bravely invited six others for dinner (hoping the mutton ham wouldn't leave us all hungry) and cooked a ham.

Most of the recipes online call for boiling, but I just didn't want to do that. I finally found someone stating they just put the ham in a pan, added about an inch of water, then covered the whole thing in foil.
The ham going in:

The six pound ham went into a 350 degree oven for three hours. For the last 20 minutes I removed the foil and coated the ham with a mixture of brown sugar, stone ground mustard, and apple cider vinegar twice.

Everyone loved the ham! It had a different hammy taste but was very good. We will definitely make mutton ham again. Next to try is "macon." It's bacon made from sheep's belly.

Lamb Chops: It's What's for Dinner

I went to pick up the lamb and mutton we had butchered and lamb chops seemed like the perfect dinner to have tonight. Along with our own red potatoes baked and a cucumber salad it was a nice little Monday night meal.

Yum.
Alan is antsy to try the mutton ham. The two hams look great but they are pretty big. If I get them again I will have to remember to ask for them to be frozen after being cut in half. The saddle of mutton looks interesting too. 

Early Rise on Black Friday?

Who me? Well not to go shopping! We got up at 4:30 AM to take a ram lamb and a mutton ewe to the butcher's. The sheep are done first and they needed to be at the butcher by 6:30. We had never been to this butcher and they are about an hour and a quarter away. Surely if we were pulling out of the driveway at 5 AM we would make it there in plenty of time! Apparently there are a couple of roads with the same name in that area and we were pretty lost. The butcher thankfully was able to take our two lost sheep and we had an uneventful ride back home. Now we are looking forward to some mutton. With the historic reenacting we do I am always looking at old receipts (recipes) for new ideas for meals in camp. Mutton was used heavily in the 17th and 18th centuries and I am eager to try some. Wonder how our group will feel about mutton ham? I also asked for the ram lamb's head so I could make "A Sheep's Head Soop." Yum?

I hope this butcher works out since they are USDA certified so I will be able to sell individual cuts of meat to buyers, instead of a whole or half lamb. This should increase the number of buyers I can attract, especially ones without a large freezer.