Venison Ham instructions Request

[wvhunter1965]

Re: venison ham???

Please make this a project

Sounds like this may be a project that should be addressed. I think many people would be interested and it might save someone from ruining their venison by doing so incorrectly.

I would assume that this would have some different requirements than pork considering the vast difference in fat content.

[BevH]

I do venison hams. I use a curing brine, 3 lbs of curing salt per gallon of water. I brine in that overnight (8-12 hours) then, inject half of that brine into the deer ham.

I use Walton’s brown sugar cure to coat the outside of the ham until it’s about 1/2 to 3/4 inch thick initially. Have plenty of cure on hand, you’ll need more every other day. I pit the ham on a draining rack inside a plastic box with a lid and, refrigerate it. I check it, drain off the water and, add more cure if I see any bare spots. Being venison, I leave it 15 days in the refrigerator and, at the start of day 16, I rinse the cure off, then soak the ham in reconstituted powdered milk for one hour before wrapping and freezing it, or cooking it.

If you like saltier ham, skip the milk soak. I like it a bit less salty.

[Namrats]

What size of ham (Lbs) do you make hams with? Thanks for sharing you method, I have been thinking about how to do this for some time, as I want to turn the hams into Sausage that can be smoked …hoping to generate a Sausage with more of a old world flair to it. You brought me me one step closer, Thanks!

[calldoctoday]

OK, I calculated ± 2.04 cups or 32.76 tablespoons of Walton’s Turkey Cure for a 10% pump to equal 1.29 pounds of cure. I hope that is right. If anyone has anything known to be more accurate (other than weighing) or scientific, please let me know. Thanks

[Austin]

wvhunter1965
I would suggest following the same guidelines for a traditional ham as with a venison ham.
Check out our normal ham recipe here:
https://meatgistics.waltonsinc.com/topic/203/how-to-make-homemade-smoked-ham-recipe

I will see if we can do some research into what may be helpful to do different with venison as opposed to pork in this specific use case though.

[wvhunter1965]

Austin, thanks for the info. Also, thanks to the members for the info they provided.

I am considering trying the venison and following the recipe for pork as suggested.

Will let you know how it turns out!

[doc_craig]

wvhunter1965
This is a recipe I use for making hams. It is pretty good. Use a 1/2 cup of tender quick to 4 cups of water to make a brine. Inject 1 oz of brine per 1 lb of meat. Rub 1 tbsp of sugar cure per 1 lb on the outside then refrigerate for 10 to 14 days. Then wash off excess salt with warm water. Then you can smoke and cook it or just plain cook it to an inside temp of 160 degrees. Very good with pork and pretty good with deer. Just have to remember deer is going to be different.