No doubt, sometimes my family eats $10 worth of meat in 5-minutes {gulp}. But then there is the beautiful occasion that I see high quality, spiral cut hams marked down to just $0.99/pound for quick sale. Quick sale indeed. I don’t even give it a second thought before putting the ham quickly into my cart. Sold!
Ok, fine. Let’s be real. I quickly put three hams into my cart. How could I resist? They were each $10 or less, and I have learned the beauty of how delicious spiral cut ham is, how easy it is to prepare, and how far I can stretch this large piece of meat. $10 for 5 meals’ worth of meat? Yeah, baby. There are teenage boys and college men and all of their friends to feed, plus a 5-year old ham-loving Bonus Boy and a hungry hard-working husband. Somewhere in there, this mom likes to eat too.
Is Laura excited about her $10 hams? Why yes, I guess this fact cannot be denied.
How to Cook a Spiral Cut Ham
First, let’s discuss how easy a spiral cut ham is to bake. Make it difficult if you prefer, but as for me and my house, we will:
- Open the package.
- Throw away the glaze packet that comes with it, because why?
- Plop the ham into a roasting pan.
- Put the lid on the pan.
- Slide the pan into the oven and bake it in a 325-degree oven for 20-minutes per pound.
Truly, doing the math to figure out the baking time takes longer than actually preparing the ham for baking. (10 pounds of ham x 20 minutes of baking time = 200 minutes divided by 60 minutes in one hour = cook my 10-pound ham for approximately 3 1/2 hours.)
Once time is up, I set the cooked ham, roasting pan and all, onto my buffet to serve it. I use a large bread knife to cut it off the bone, which takes no effort because it falls off the bone anyway, and it has already been spiral cut.
How Delicious is a Spiral Cut Ham?
Oh my dears. There is not much better. And I don’t even add any fancy topping or glaze. Mmm, it is fantastic.
How a Spiral Cut Ham Feeds My LARGE Family 5 Meals
What’s beautiful about how easy it is to stretch one ham into at least 5 meals is that it’s not even a stretch. One 10-pound ham provides a LOT of meat. Amen and amen. Here is a typical way I can use one ham to provide my family (of 7) with 5 great meals!
- Bake it as directed above, and serve it as a Sunday meal after church with Cheesy Hashbrown Casserole, salad, and veggies on the side.
- Use small leftover pieces of ham the next morning to make Ham and Cheesy Eggs in a skillet. (This actually gets them out of bed in the morning because it smells so good!)
- Stir pieces of leftover ham into a big batch of Creamy Mac and Cheese. I can’t tell you how delicious.
- Stir pieces of leftover ham into a pan of Simple Ham and Hashbrown Casserole.
- Use larger slices of ham to make BLTs, or rather HLTs since we are using ham instead of bacon. Or better yet, make HLT Wraps. How can anything taste any better?
We’re talking about 5 meals filled with healthy portions of meat that tastes delicious. Happy, happy, happy.
Other meals to create with your leftover ham include adding ham to:
- Regular cold ham sandwiches
- Simple Hashbrown and Egg Nests
- Simple Three Cheese Spaghetti
- Simple Waffle Omelets
- Last Minute Creamy Bacon Spaghetti (except use ham instead of bacon)
- Use the ham bone to make broth – which takes your purchase even farther!
By the way, finding a $10 ham isn’t a regular occurrence for me, just an incredibly exciting one! But often at Christmas or Easter time I find them for $20ish. While a $10 ham gives us 5 meals for just $2 each (!!!), a $20 ham still provides us with 5 meals at only $4 each. It’s fun to think this through when considering a purchase like this. How far with this meat stretch? How many meals can I get out of my $20 (or $10!)? The same is often true of a holiday turkey. I love it when stretching meat is easy!
How do you like to use leftover ham?
AnnaT says
Hi Laura:
Chopped up bits of baked ham are delicious added to potato soup.. gives it a rich smoky flavor. Can always top with a bit of shredded cheese too!
Tosha Kelly says
Not to mention the broth made from the ham hock that can be used for yummy soup!
GreenDoor says
The best thing about Easter (well, besides celebrating the fact that we are saved, of course) is finally getting ham at a good price! I keep the bone wrapped up for soup. For the ham I’m buying for the freezer, I cut it into one-meal portions and trim that rougher skin from the smoking process as I go. I keep all those rough skin schnibbles and bag those up for split pea orbean soup. Just strain them out after the split peas/beans all soften. Yum!!
Do you serve pineapple on the side of your ham slices? Nothing better than a cube of salty ham with a bit of sweet pina!
Cindy says
Have you ever tried grilled pineapple rings? – they are amazing :)
Cindy says
I just made ham chowder from Martha Stewart magazine. It was DELISH! If this link works, there are 3 more ideas for leftover ham and they all look scrumptious (Alsatian Flatbread – i.e. pizza, twice baked croissants and ham and snow pea fried rice)
https://www.marthastewart.com/1537966/delicious-ideas-use-leftover-easter-ham
I liked these recipes because they are all very different. Sometimes my family goes on a leftovers revolt. Making very different things (with the same large amount of meat leftover) sometimes helps avoid outright family revolts.
Michele says
Great suggestions! I also make scalloped potatoes and ham, ham and spinach quiche, and grind up ham for westerns or easterns or ground ham and egg salad sandwiches!
Laura says
My favorite is to use the ham bone to make pea soup in the Crockpot!
Bethany Lotulelei says
Mmm. That sounds delicious!!